


The Rising Wind

by Iturbide



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale, 半妖の夜叉姫 | Hanyou no Yashahime | Yashahime: Princess Half-Demon (Anime)
Genre: F/M, Grief/Mourning, Slow Burn, Temporary Character Death, Tumblr Prompt, not fully compliant with Yashahime
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:28:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 32,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28130169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iturbide/pseuds/Iturbide
Summary: Kagura had always been the wind -- she simply returned to it when she died.  Harboring more than a few regrets of things left unsaid, the soul on the breeze finds that she can still exert at least some power over the dead, and she puppets a human corpse to relay her last words to Sesshomaru; perhaps it is fate, perhaps mere fortune, but his healing blade manages to bind her within that form, giving her a second chance in life to have everything she never knew she wanted.Fill forSevera'sWind Prompt
Relationships: Kagura & Kohaku (InuYasha), Kagura & Rin (InuYasha), Kagura/Sesshoumaru (InuYasha), Minor or Background Relationship(s), Rin & Sesshoumaru (InuYasha)
Comments: 42
Kudos: 87





	1. Freedom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Severa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severa/gifts).



> Funny story: this was supposed to be _short._
> 
> ~~I should have known better, I don't know how to write "short" things.~~
> 
> I've been a quiet fan of InuYasha for years -- I still remember watching its original US run on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim -- but it was never something that compelled me to write for it the way that other series have. I just enjoyed the characters and watching their story unfold. I was really interested in seeing how Yashahime might continue that story, but...well. 
> 
> Then, a while back, this prompt showed up on my dash. I read it, thought it was fascinating, moved on with my dash. 
> 
> But I kept thinking about it. For the better part of a week I could not get that post out of my head. Eventually I caved and (with permission -- thanks so much again, Severa!) wrote this in reply. It's mostly true to the outline, with a few minor tweaks and a whole _lot_ of embellishments, but I hope it stays true to the heart of the prompt source. 
> 
> This is pretty far outside my usual wheelhouse, and I've never actually written for this fandom before, but I've had the original InuYasha and Final Arc on in the background pretty much constantly while I wrote this, so here's hoping I did okay with the characters. 
> 
> And one final note: dashes (-) represent scene breaks throughout the chapter. Enjoy!

_I am the wind._

As the heart she'd long sought failed her, Kagura felt no despair. No grief. No rage. Only _relief._ Sesshomaru had come in her final moments: it was all she could have asked for, to have his face be the last she saw in life. Her strength did not abandon her; she let it go, instead, and as her body dispersed into so many motes of miasma, her final breath rushed out, and up, high above the trees and into the bright blue sky.

The wind eddied, cradling the feather once used to pin her hair, now her final anchor to the life that she had known. The breeze beckoned her, coaxed with every subtle shift in the current. And at last, she gave herself to it, and let the sweet wind carry her away, scattering in all directions and fragmenting her consciousness a dozen times, a score, a hundred, more than she could name nor count, until all that remained of what she had once been was a faint awareness and a handful of faded recollections like leaves before winter's first gale.

_The free wind._

For the first time in her brief life, she knew contentment -- _embraced it,_ aware of the blades of grass rippling beneath her, of the wave spray billowing over and around her, of the snow dancing with her, of the birds that she carried up toward the distant sun. Each fragment of who she had been saw and felt something different, something new, something she had perhaps imagined once, or known so briefly as to make it feel like the stirring of a long-forgotten dream. Her touch rustled the leaves on the trees, tousled countless maidens' hair, rippled the glassy surfaces of untold lakes, caressed fur both coarse and impossibly soft...

_...is this...?_

Something sparked within her consciousness. A memory, flickering, weak as a candle in a drafty room. A trailing ruff of long, pale fur, longer even than the white hair cascading down alongside it. Golden eyes that had only ever seemed cold or impassive in how they regarded her, suddenly tinged with something like pity. 

Across the land, the wind stilled as she focused her whole attention on a place dark as night, lit by an otherworldly glow. The touch of her gentle breeze stirred the cool grass, carrying motes of light through the air...and rustling the red-edged silk kimono with its empty left sleeve.

"The wind..."

The young girl ever at Sesshomaru's heels looked up, watching the lights drift overhead. Could she sense the presence in the wind?

Could he?

"Let's go," the demon ordered, striding into the dark. The child and the imp scampered in his wake, and the breeze flowed past them, quickly leaving them behind as the wind rose once more across the four corners of the realm, converging over the storm-tossed waves into a great gale twisting between the sea and sky.

_I am the wind._

With her scattered consciousness gathered together, the scope of the world shrank once more -- but her awareness grew, and with it the gusting wind no longer carried her but instead moved by her own will. She danced, formless and free, salt spray following the sweep of her every gesture and billowing before her as she raced above the waves, sweeping over the clifftops, across the rocky ground, and through the open fields well beyond the roads that humans walked.

These were the places he favored. She had found him once already -- it was only a matter of time until she found him again. After all: she was the wind.

_I am Kagura._

\-----

She scattered herself from time to time, but never again into the countless fragments of her first breath of freedom. The further she dispersed her consciousness, the harder it became to remember her _self,_ and while there was a certain kind of the freedom that came with such a muted awareness of the world around her, it was not the sort she longed for. And Kagura wanted to witness the changes sweeping through the land.

Kanna perished not long after Kagura met her own end. She visited her sister in the moments before her death, a gentle breeze caressing the cracked porcelain face and smoothing hair as white and soft as freshly fallen snow. She wondered if Kanna recognized her presence, in that touch -- but, as ever, the girl showed no expression even when her body began to splinter and crack from the pressure of the cruel hand squeezing her heart.

Kagura departed before the mirror shattered. For all her strength, she could not bear to watch that death. But long after the light faded and the battlefield emptied, a quiet breeze blew over the crater, swirling to and fro to gather the crystalline powder around the empty silver frame before a light rain washed the grave. A simple gesture, perhaps, but the girl had never thought much of grand ones. This was all she could do: she hoped it would be enough to bring Kanna some peace.

Naraku, too, was not long for the world, and she took vindictive pleasure in witnessing his demise at the hands of Sesshomaru, InuYasha, and their companions. The wind sang sweetly through the fields and forests on the day that wretched spider met its end, and though she could not say that _peace_ came in the wake of its fall, the wars that remained were but petty human conflicts beyond the care of demonkind.

With nothing else to divide her attention, she took to wandering, visiting those who she remembered fondly from her former life. Though they were but two in number now, their wanderings made tracking them down a challenge -- and one she found rather pleasant, in truth, since it gave her every excuse to see the world in her searching. Kohaku, it seemed, had chosen to follow in his elder sister's footsteps, taking up the mantle of demon slayer and offering his services to any and all in need. She found him often near human settlements, though at times he wandered far afield to meet the demon weaponsmith Totosai -- and strange as it seemed even to her, she was happy to see him well. He deserved this chance at life: she was pleased to see him using it.

Sesshomaru was infinitely more difficult to track down. He spurned the towns and villages so favored by mankind, preferring the deep wilds and perilous crags where only the most foolhardy men dared venture, for fear of the demons that lived and thrived there. The sole exception was the place closest to the Tree of Ages where his ward now stayed in the company of his former foes turned allies; his visits there were brief, though not rare, and often enough she happened across him flying away from the hut where the young girl now lived. She flew with him, when she did: he might not need the wind to carry him aloft, but she enjoyed traveling alongside him, easing his way by calming the gusts and clearing the skies ahead. And each time he reached his destination, she continued on, rippling the grasses and rustling the leaves in her wake in a subtle parting gesture.

Sometimes she turned back for a final look before she continued on her way. And sometimes she faltered in her course, for she found him looking back.

Seasons changed. Her passage shook the first red and gold leaves from the trees, and she carried them with her to lay before him. Soon after came the first snow, and she spun the flakes ahead to dust his path. When the flowers bloomed anew, she blew their perfumed petals to greet him with the first trace of winter's end. Chancing across a soft white feather, she carried it to him on a whim, a reminder of who she had been floating past on the breeze that remained. When she stopped to think, it all felt foolish -- bringing tokens for someone who couldn't see her, who didn't even know she was still part of the world...

...yet as the plume danced before him, Sesshomaru watched it for so long that she dared to imagine he could sense her presence in the gentle wind.

\-----

Kagura had been born with no interest in human conflicts, and she had died with the same disinterest. They persisted, though, frustratingly constant: too often she blew through the fields that should have led her to Sesshomaru, only to find evidence of a recent battle that surely would have diverted his course. Battering the meaningless standards with a particularly fierce gale, she carried on through the billowing smoke and the countless corpses of fallen warriors...

The wind stilled.

Breezing closer, she drifted over the bloody scene, disturbing tattered banners and ruffling the arrow fletchings lodged in broken armor. She'd bent the dead to her will in her former life, puppeteering them to fight her battles or deliver messages...

How far did her power extend, now that her will was no longer bound to a body?

She scoured the field once, then again, blowing over each corpse in turn. Those missing legs she passed over without a second thought: if the body could not walk, it could not get far enough to suit her needs; those missing heads she abandoned with equal speed, for she could see no value in a puppet unable to speak. Next she weeded out those with wounds that would hobble their progress -- spilled entrails, twisted ankles -- then those with injuries that would draw unwanted attention -- half-severed arms, naginata impalements -- until she was left with but a handful of possibilities. And from those, she selected the one in the best apparent condition: a wandering samurai, judging by the sorry state of his armor and the half-dozen arrows that had pierced it to bring him down.

It would do for a test, if nothing else.

Empty lungs filled with wind. The gale twisted around the dead human, lifting it out of the mud to stand on its own feet. Dividing her attention around the body, she moved each limb in turn, flexing the jaw, forcing air from its chest in a crude attempt at speech. This had been easy once: with but a flick of her fan, shattered corpses would rebuild themselves and go striding off to do her bidding, spinning truths and lies with equal ease. Now she needed to fragment herself simply to make a wordless noise.

But she managed it, after a few attempts. One leg moved, then the other, a lurching stride that gradually smoothed as she found a rhythm to the puppetry. From there, she fought with speech -- and the body stumbled and threatened to fall as she neglected the rest of the marionette dance in her eagerness to progress. The wind stilled, and for a moment the corpse teetered where it stood, held in place as much by its own stiff joints as the wind flowing around it...before she tried anew, patiently moving each limb in turn until the body walked with comparative ease off the field of battle and into the sparse trees. Forcing herself to maintain that rhythm, she once more turned to speech, twisting the body's lips and tongue until she found the proper combinations for each syllable. Stringing those together proved a greater challenge still, and the gravelly voice slurred over simple words like wind and sea and sky...but those, too, gradually cleared while her puppet staggered on.

A day passed. Then another. And another. But though she loosed another fragment of herself to find Sesshomaru, she knew she would not succeed in this attempt. Corpses could not feel cold, nor heat, nor pain, nor even their own decay; with every hour that passed, her puppet rotted slightly more, until she could hold it together no longer.

She abandoned the warrior far from the battlefield where he'd fallen. Swirling up through the leaves and into the clouds to banish the corpse stench from the wind, she waited, flowing along through the mist until the wandering breeze at last drifted over familiar fur. And then she scattered herself to the four corners, seeking out the human settlements nearest to the unbeaten paths Sesshomaru trod. 

Humans were weak, short-lived creatures, after all. Finding another to puppet would be a simple task.

\-----

The squall sprang to life out of nowhere, howling gales tearing at the treetops and whipping clothes from their poles into the blackened sky while villagers ran for cover. 'Fickle weather,' they called it as thunder roared overhead. And Kagura might have laughed, if she had anything but fury left to spare. 

She'd lost count of how many attempts she'd made to reach him. All had ended in failure. The first ones she'd taken well enough as lessons, however frustrating they might have been. From the warrior she learned how to control a borrowed body, and how brief a time she had before time took its toll on the corpse. From the maiden she'd found next, awaiting burial in a village not far from where Sesshomaru wandered, she learned that humans were not the cowards she expected, and rather than flee the body that rose from its resting place they charged, overpowered the wind, and hurried through the rest of their ceremony before reducing the corpse to useless ash. From the priestess after that, caught in a blizzard and unable to reach the safety of her shrine before the cold took her, she learned that the wind could only force an able body to move so far, and when the corpse's joints froze solid mid-stride she was forced to abandon the effort entirely.

Yet none of those lessons had gotten her any closer, in the end. Even after she stopped minding the appearances of the bodies she used, casting off notions of finding one that resembled her old reflection in Kanna's mirror and simply using what she was able; regardless of how carefully she planned, avoiding any but the most promising efforts in winter or summer; no matter how hard she tried, choosing the path least likely to break her puppet while still reaching her goal before it decayed beyond use; every time -- _every time! --_ she fell far short. Only the wind could reach him, it seemed.

And the wind could not speak on its own.

The storm died down into an autumn shower, her spent rage giving way to hopelessness -- something she'd not submitted to for longer than she could remember anymore. Not since the day her own body perished, utterly alone in a field of flowers stained red by her poisoned blood. It was futile, wasn't it? This foolish notion of meeting him, of speaking with him again...no more worthwhile than the leaves and flowers she'd carried into his path. What purpose could he have for them? Or for her, in turn?

...he had come, though. Even knowing that the scent he followed that day would not lead him to Naraku, Sesshomaru had come.

The rain slowed. And at last it ceased, patches of sunlight appearing through the thinning clouds. As the villagers emerged from their shelters to resume their work and collect their storm-scattered belongings, the wind blew on through the fields and forests, past the demon and his loyal imp, splitting apart to seek out another body -- another chance.

In her final moments, wracked with pain and despair, when she had wanted nothing more than to see him, Sesshomaru had appeared before her. Whether it took another year or another hundred, she would thank him for that.

\-----

Time meant little to the wind: the seasons might dictate whether snow or rain blew about in the gale, but the breeze itself was eternal. She could no longer remember how long ago her body had died, freeing her to roam the endless sky. She'd lost track of how many summers had warmed the lands she wandered, how many winters had chilled them...how many times she'd tried to guide a borrowed body into Sesshomaru's path. Perhaps that was for the best: the less she thought about the failures, the quicker she could muster herself to make another attempt.

And this one had some promise. Sesshomaru was nearby -- and more than that, she'd stumbled across a woman another mile on, weeping as she waded her way toward the heart of a lake. A disgraced lord's daughter, perhaps, or an exiled aristocrat: certainly a lady of some standing, judging by her multi-layered garments. Kagura had no interest in _why_ the human sought to end her life, though; she just wanted the woman to hurry, impatiently circling the shore and rustling the reeds growing up from the water's edge.

The body thrashed in the deep water, drenched robes pulling it down until it exhausted its feeble strength. And when the last bubbles vanished from the surface, the wind gusted over the scene, slowly dragging the drowned body toward the lake edge. When she finally reached the shallows, the woman's head at last turned into the air, just enough for her nose and mouth to breach the surface -- and the wind poured into waterlogged lungs, giving Kagura the grip she needed to haul the corpse onto the shore by its own power. 

Her first steps were labored, staggering under the weight of sodden silk. It wasn't as though she had any need for it, herself: shedding one layer after another, she cast off the heavy adornments, twisted and tied the bedraggled hair out of the way, wrung the kimono sleeves mostly dry...

And then she ran, the wind at her back carrying the borrowed body onward as sparse brush gave way to sprawling fields. She was close now -- she was _so close,_ she _had_ to succeed this time, she _had_ to...

The grass gave way to pale wildflowers, cream-colored petals swaying as far as she could see. And there he was, still as stone, looking toward the sky. If he took flight, she would never be able to catch him.

The wind filled the body’s empty chest. 

"Sesshomaru!"

He did not startle at the call. He merely turned his gaze from the clouds to the woman running toward him, as indifferent to her as to the butterflies drifting around him. 

The imp was another matter. "Insolent wench! Who do you think you are, showing such disrespect to the great Lord Sesshomaru!?"

Typical. But she paid no heed to the little demon's tirade. "You always were a hard one to track down. It's nice to know that some things haven't changed."

"Do you know this woman, Milord?" the imp asked, turning to his master.

Sesshomaru did not spare him so much as a glance, fixing her with a stare intense enough to quail a mortal -- though she was hardly that anymore. "What business does a corpse have with me?"

She had never tried laughing in any of her other attempts at puppetry. But it came now without conscious effort, a watery chuckle as she folded her arms. "Your nose is keen as ever, I see. I wanted to speak with you, but I needed to borrow a body to do so."

His eyes narrowed, but still she did not flinch. "Who are you?"

The corpse's lips curved into a smile, tugged up by a gentle breeze. "I am the wind."

Something changed in his expression, his calm giving way to thinly-veiled fury. He did not voice it, though: instead it was the little demon that charged toward her, waving his two-headed staff in a pitiful attempt at intimidation. "How _dare_ you make such a claim--"

"Be _silent,_ Jaken."

The imp obeyed instantly, scampering out of reach behind his lord. Sesshomaru stepped forward, lifting a clawed hand -- but still, she did not give her ground. She was the wind: any harm that befell the corpse she puppeted meant nothing to her. Another step, and his hand reached into his armor; another, and she saw him withdraw a thin object, dark wood tied with a thick scarlet cord...

If she'd had a beating heart, it might have stopped.

"You claim to be the wind? Prove it, then," he ordered, holding the folded fan out to her. 

She had never bothered to practice manipulating objects before, and her grip was weak when she took it in her hands. But her fan had been a part of her in her former life, not the source of her power but the instrument conducting her will: in a flash she snapped it open, guided by memories clear as a cloudless sky. What she held was not the one she'd used before -- it was new, pristine, unsullied by blood or miasma as her own had been -- but it was otherwise a near-perfect likeness, down to the crimson streaks on pale paper. "Where did you get this?" she asked, nearly forgetting to put air to the words her lips formed.

"Are words all you have to back your claim?"

Her puppet's head came up, fixing the demon with a look as icy as his own glare _._ Lifting the fan, she held it out from her, adopting a familiar stance from her old life, and while the damp silk still hindered some of her movements it was hardly enough to warrant fighting free of another sleeve. One step forward, raising her arm high; a half-step right, sweeping her arm down in a graceful arc; a full turn, the fan dancing in her hand like a swallow on the breeze; and though she still took care to keep her borrowed body upright, she left mere fragments to that work while the greater part of herself swirled around him, gathering the petals from the flowers at their feet and lifting them high overhead to rain down...

The woman stumbled. Kagura’s frustrated sigh gusted through the grass, the wind swirling back around the corpse as she resumed her marionette dance. "Is that proof enough?" she asked, snapping the fan closed. Not that she had any other ideas; it was difficult enough to make this borrowed body move and speak -- if she needed to do _more_ she would have to abandon the corpse entirely to amass enough strength...

"What did you wish to speak of, Kagura?"

His voice had softened since that last rebuke, and she relaxed in turn, easing her tense grip on the borrowed body. "I wanted to thank you."

"Thank me," he repeated. 

"For coming that day," she continued. "I had never been afraid of dying, while my heart was not my own, but...when I found myself alone, knowing I wouldn't survive, I..."

The corpse’s voice sounded choked, and she loosened her grip on the puppet's throat. Strange, how strong that memory was, even after so much time had passed. "I was afraid of dying alone. It made me question the freedom I'd been yearning for, all that time. But you came. For me. It...made letting go easier. I was grateful for it -- I'm _still_ grateful for it. And I wanted to tell you myself."

She'd lost count of how many times in her life she'd been called a fool. By Naraku, by his incarnations, by her enemies, even by herself. And perhaps she was one: she certainly felt foolish enough, standing here before him, finally able to speak and realizing as she did how pointless it all was. What good was her gratitude to him...?

"Is it a new body you seek?"

She watched his hand settle on the sword by his side. The same one he'd reached for when he found her that day -- the same one that had opened the gates to the Netherworld. "I didn't come looking for a favor--"

"So you stated. But my question stands. Do you desire a body?"

...did she? She'd never thought beyond reaching him and delivering her message. She had been content with the thought of resuming her wanderings as the wind, unfettered and free...but if she had another choice? Another chance to touch the world -- another chance to _live..._?

"And if I did? What of it?"

He drew the bright blade by way of answer. "Would that body serve?"

"It suits me well enough," she conceded, glancing down at it. Rather soft and frail, perhaps, but that could be fixed with enough effort...

He gave her no time to brace herself -- not that it would have done the corpse any good. The sword left no mark as it slashed her borrowed body, twice in quick succession and at odd angles...but those swift strokes did _something_ she could not define. The wind had held her puppet upright since she'd dragged it from the water, but now some strange force dragged her in, pulling her down to the base of watery lungs...and then deeper still, into a darkness unlike anything she had ever known in life or death.

Wretched sobs echoed through the gloom. _"No! I did not want this! Why would you call me back -- why must you torment me!? Free me from this sorrowful existence -- let me go! Let me go, I beg you!!"_

_"Quit your weeping,"_ she snapped. _"I have no interest in dragging you back. Stay dead, if that's what you want."_

An invisible presence surrounded her, battering her from all sides. _"Then why have you brought me here!?"_ a woman's voice demanded. _"Who are you!?"_

Kagura held fast, digging in even as the unknown force crushed inward. _"What does it matter to you?"_

_"You would take my place -- take my body, my life, my dignity! Who are you that you would dare!?"_

_"I am Kagura -- I AM THE WIND!!"_

The gale howled, swirling out around her and pushing the woman's presence back, further and further until all that remained in the dark was silence, stillness...calm...

Her heart beat.

Kagura breathed in the scent of flowers. Damp silk clung to her skin, the chill raising gooseflesh wherever it lay. The breeze stirred her hair, stray locks caressing her cheeks. Opening her eyes, she watched the blossoms gently swaying around her...and when she lifted her head, she saw Sesshomaru standing over her, sword still in hand. It was all so familiar...but rather than feeling her life seeping out of her, her strength crept back as her body warmed from the flowing blood within and the gentle sunshine without.

While Sesshomaru sheathed his sword, she rose to her feet, unsteady as a newborn fawn. It felt strange being confined to a physical form again, having known the boundless freedom of the open sky...yet the thought of touching the world as more than a passing breath of wind made her heart race within her chest. "Seems I owe you twice over," she chuckled, tapping the fan into her opposite palm.

"Are you going?" the demon asked calmly.

"...I would rather come, if it's all the same to you," she replied. The imp at his heels drew a breath to protest--

"As you wish."

Turning away, the demon began to walk toward the distant trees with his servant scampering behind him. And as she found her balance in her strange new form, Kagura followed close behind, the wind singing at her heels.


	2. Companionship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once more able to touch the world, Kagura decides to follow Sesshomaru, ostensibly to pay the debt she owes him for giving her another chance at life (though truthfully she wouldn't mind getting to know him a little better), and finds herself grappling with new challenges and old memories alike.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mentioned there were a lot of embellishments on the original prompt? This is what I meant. I didn't intend to dig into Kagura's old relationships when I started, but hey, I'm willing to roll with it. Also, bonus points if you can guess what the demons are. ;) 
> 
> Once again, dashes (-) indicate changes of scene. Enjoy!

They walked until the flowers were but a distant memory and the sun finally vanished below the mountain peaks, hiding the subtle trails they followed through the dense forest; though it left her legs sore and feet aching, she welcomed even that discomfort after so long feeling only the faintest sensations. Sesshomaru finally stopped in a clearing where the darkening sky was visible through a break in the canopy, and she followed suit without argument, looking around for anything of interest that might have given him pause...

"Wait here," the demon ordered -- and before she could even think to question, he took off, flying up over the treetops and out of sight.

"Where's he off to?" she muttered.

"Lord Sesshomaru has many urgent matters and pressing business to attend--"

"You can just say you don't know," Kagura cut him off. The little demon puffed up in clear indignation, which she ignored entirely, gathering up fallen branches for kindling to stave off night's growing chill. Much of the silk had dried, but for better or worse, her new body was a human one, and humans were frail creatures with many needs. At the very least, her command of the wind remained intact, and a swift flick of her fan cleared a space in the leaf litter for her to lay her prize. "Care to lend a hand?" she asked.

The imp huffed. But, however grudgingly, he still hefted his staff, summoning a gout of flame to set the wood ablaze. The heat swept over her as she settled beside the fire, breathing a contented sigh as she held her hands toward it. The cold had never bothered her before, but there was a strange sort of pleasure in feeling it recede, replaced instead by growing warmth. 

"Thank you." Another huff was his only reply -- though it seemed to mollify him somewhat, judging from the way he glanced toward her across the flames. "It's Jaken, isn't it?"

"What of it?" the little demon grumbled.

"What are you doing out here?"

"What business is it of yours?"

"Well, if I'm coming along, I'd like to know where we're going and why so I can make myself useful."

"No one asked you to come," the imp muttered under his breath.

"I don't like the idea of being indebted to someone. Especially not for my life." She'd lived long enough under that cruel yoke, her beating heart held as collateral to keep her in line (and her hand strayed up to her breast, reassured by its steady pulse beneath her palm). "So the sooner it's repaid, the sooner I'll be gone -- and knowing what's going on will make it easier to settle."

He glowered at her for another moment, seeming to weigh his options while she basked in the firelight. "Lord Sesshomaru seeks to establish his dominion over the western territories," he conceded at last. "From what I gather, his father held the title 'Lord of the Western Lands' before him, and he has lately endeavored to secure the same in his own right."

She hummed, loosing her hair and working her fingers through the snarls. "How has that been going so far?"

"Milord's might is more than sufficient to subdue any who dare challenge him," Jaken replied proudly. And from everything she knew, demons did respect strength above all things. "A human has no place in such dangerous affairs, being so weak, so it would be best for you to simply move along--"

"Then what are _you_ doing here?" she shot back. 

"I am Lord Sesshomaru's faithful servant!" the imp scoffed.

"I don't recall you ever being much use in a fight," she pointed out. "If _you_ can find a purpose to serve, I don't see what would stop me from doing the same. And he used to bring that human child along everywhere -- Rin, wasn't it?"

"For your information, Milord left her behind in the village where InuYasha resides before embarking on this mission."

"Are you implying this is _more_ dangerous than hunting down Naraku?"

He had no ready answer for that.

Fortunately for the little demon, a sudden rustling from the canopy above heralded the return of his master. Sesshomaru landed with barely a sound, ignoring his attendant's enthusiastic greeting as he made his way around the fire. "Welcome back," she offered, glancing up at him when he stopped at her side.

The demon said nothing; instead he deposited a bundle beside her before moving out of the firelight and into the shadows beyond. Shrugging to herself, Kagura unwrapped the parcel, removing a lacquered wooden comb, a new kosode _..._ and two elaborately patterned kimonos cut in a familiar dancer's style, accompanied by a traditional obi. "What is all this?" she called after his silhouette.

"If it is not to your liking, you need not accept it," he replied.

Which wasn't the issue at all. "Seems my debt just keeps mounting," she muttered. But she still discarded the silks without a second thought, donning the new garments in their place and reveling in the familiarity of how they moved with her. Even if the sash might take some getting used to, the rest was better than she could have hoped for. "Thank you."

She thought she saw him glance back at her, the gleam of firelight catching his golden eyes. But he gave her no reply, and she chose not to press the matter further. leaving only a deafening silence rife with words unspoken.

\-----

It took time to condition her new body for long journeys, and she spent countless days sore and aching from morning to moonrise. It frustrated her at first, especially when she heard the imp grumbling about their slow progress as though they had a schedule to keep that Kagura had irreparably slowed...but whenever she heard those complaints (and even when she didn't), Sesshomaru swiftly silenced his servant with a sharp remark. It might not have made the physical travel any easier, but it certainly calmed some measure of her impatience. 

Beyond those reprimands, the demon said little, and days sometimes passed where they spoke no more than a handful of words to one another. It was familiar: Kanna had been similarly prone to silence and acting without explanation, and just as she'd come to accept it from the child, so too did she raise no protest with him -- but she was ever aware of his attention, from the subtle shifts in their pace allowing her to keep up when she faltered to the more overt glances from the corners of his eyes. All gestures easily missed, but strangely common even as the weeks went by and her human body adjusted past where such considerations were necessary. 

It was a dance, she realized. They circled one another, watchful, waiting for the other to take the next step...even though she had no idea what it should be. 

So she waited.

The deeper they traveled into the wilds, the more demons they encountered. Many gave them a wide berth, recognizing Sesshomaru's might for the threat it was. Others postured, hoping to intimidate the band into changing course, only to be quelled once the demon flexed his claws. In spite of the undeniable frailty of her human body, Kagura felt no fear in those encounters, trusting Sesshomaru's might as much as her own control of the wind, ingrained in her first life and carefully rehoned night after night in her next...but the further they went, and the stronger the foes they encountered, the more she kept her fan open and ready, rather than shuttered at ease.

They finally reached an impasse at the foot of the mountains where the forest and scrub gave way to bare rock. They had seen the signs of demon activity in the days before: evidence of past fights and the scattered bones of the vanquished, scores and gouges in trees and rocks alike -- yet whatever she'd imagined from those traces was nothing like the demons that poured from the cliffside den as they approached: wings pinioning and feathers flying, they swarmed into the sky from the caves in the mountain's face, turning their long noses up at the demon and his entourage. "Well well!" the largest of them cackled, hovering high overhead. "It seems a little dog has come wandering into our territory."

"You will regret speaking so callously to the great Lord Sesshomaru!!" Jaken shouted (from safely behind his master, she noted).

"Sesshomaru, is it? The dog demon's whelp?" the leader goaded. "Why have you come?"

"I am traveling to the east," Sesshomaru replied.

"And you seek passage through our valley?" the winged demon scoffed. "Why should we allow that?"

Sesshomaru lay his hand tellingly on the swords at his hip. "I intend to go, whether you allow it or not."

The sky filled with raucous laughter that set her teeth on edge. "You certainly know how to bark, little dog. But barking is all it is -- no self-respecting demon would dare take a _human_ for a follower."

It took Kagura a moment to realize that they were referring to her -- which only made her sneer, snapping her fan open and gently waving it before her face. "You might be surprised by this 'human,'" she taunted, catching the slightest turn of Sesshomaru's head as he cast a glance over his shoulder.

"We'll see about that," the winged demon scoffed.

She watched the dark shapes swarm out of the sky, felt the wind from their flight buffet her as they plunged toward the ground -- and with a smile she turned, the sweep of her fan calling forth a howling gale the swirled up toward the clouds, dragging in the demons and ripping them to shreds. Their screams carried over the wind, echoing through the canyon as the whirlwind tore through their ranks...but while feathers and gore rained down upon the stones, she saw yet more corpses nearly intact on the ground, vivid green energy crackling across their remains. She did not need to search for Sesshomaru: he was shockingly close, barely a pace away with sword in hand; she had never seen him draw his other blade before, but now she stood entranced by the runes etched along its surface...

"You're not a human -- what manner of demon are you!?" the leader demanded, flying high to evade their reach.

"I am the wind," she called back, stepping up beside Sesshomaru. "Shall I bring it down?" she added, keeping her voice low so that only he could hear. He glanced at her from the corner of his eye, and she smiled back, her fan half-folded and ready to call on the gale...

"No need," he said, sheathing his blade again. Shrugging to herself, Kagura snapped her fan closed, letting it rest across her arm where she could easily open it anew if the need arose. Not that it was necessary, though: the winged demon made no further protest, nor any move to stop them as they proceeded into the canyon and away from the recent carnage.

Silence fell again, comfortable and easy. Breathing in the cool, clean air beyond the battlefield, she felt her heartbeat slow...

"Well done."

Kagura looked up, startled by the unexpected approval. Sesshomaru did not look at her, though: he merely continued on as though he'd not spoken at all. Had she imagined it…?

Jaken sniffled, looking somewhere between distraught and enraged as he glowered up at her. "Milord has never granted me such praise before..."

She smirked down at him, tapping the fan against her forearm. "Seems I've been more useful in five minutes than you have in the last five decades."

"Why you--!"

_"Jaken,"_ Sesshomaru snapped. The warning in his voice instantly silenced the imp, who fell back another several paces for good measure...and Kagura smiled to herself, feeling certain that the unspoken dance had shifted forward.

\-----

Kagura was no longer certain what she was anymore.

She had been born into the world as a demon of some sort, a monstrous thing concocted through the power of the Shikon Jewel for the sole purpose of defeating InuYasha and his allies. With the destruction of that form, she became the wind, unfettered and free -- yet somehow still unnatural, her consciousness and soul commanding the breeze as easily in death as she had in life. And now she inhabited a human form -- not a puppet, but one that lived and breathed and _felt_...and which seemed irrevocably altered by the wind’s presence. 

Even beyond the breeze that still moved by her will, a power no human possessed to her knowledge, her body was changing. She'd cut her hair just below her shoulders shortly after her revival, frustrated by its unmanageable floor length, and while watching the woman from the shore she was sure that it had been uniformly dark; as it grew out, she began to notice streaks of color tracing back to her temples, nearly the same shade as the stripes on her fan. Some part of her dreaded what she might find if she studied her reflection too long: what other features were shifting that she could not see...?

Part of her was glad that Kanna was no longer with her. She wasn't sure she could face a clear image of herself in that mirror...let alone her sister's silent gaze.

Perhaps her own doubts kept her from rest. Perhaps it was the memories stirred by thoughts of her former life. But sleep evaded her, despite her best efforts; after what felt like an age of lying still to no effect, she gave up, rising from her place beside the embers and making her way to the edge of the lake near the place they'd stopped to rest. The rains had been poor, judging from the mere trickle seeping down the worn cliff face where she would have expected a waterfall, but the moon was bright and the water still as a looking glass...

She hesitated. And that pause, especially over something so _trivial,_ only frustrated her more. Gritting her teeth, she whipped her fan open and sent a gale slicing toward the distant rocks; it did not cut the stones, but the ripples of its wake cascaded outward from the shore where she stood, turning the moon's image into a pale splash of color blurred beyond recognition. When had she become so weak, that she could not even bear to face her reflection?

Or had she always been this way, and simply ignored it until this moment?

A quiet sound made her whirl, fan wide and ready to fend off an attack...for little more than the heartbeat it took to recognize Sesshomaru. Sighing to herself, she shuttered her weapon and tucked it into her sleeve before crouching by the water's edge. "Trouble sleeping?" she asked.

"No."

She felt her lips twitch into a wry smile as she propped her chin in her hands. "I suppose that makes sense. I don't recall ever seeing you sleep." He made no reply...but from the corner of her eye she saw him move closer, turning to look out over the lake as she did. "You remind me of someone I used to know."

"Who?"

"Kanna. I can't recall if you ever met her. She was an incarnation like me. A little girl about this tall," she gestured, approximating her sister's height, "with white hair and fair skin, carrying a mirror in a silver frame."

He made a vague sound which could have been either confirmation or denial. "She didn't say much," Kagura continued. "She was always quiet. The way she moved, the way she spoke...and if she didn't have to speak, she didn't. She was...like a china doll: pretty, but not expressive. Not unless you knew what to look for."

She thought she saw him glance toward her, though it could just as easily have been a trick of the moonlight. "Back then she and Kohaku were the only allies I felt anything for -- well. Anything other than disgust. Or hatred. I tried to keep Kohaku safe, when I could." It had sealed her fate, in the end...but she didn't regret that, knowing it had helped him survive. "Looking back...Kanna did the same for me. She was bound to Naraku more tightly than I was, couldn't rebel the way I did...but she still tried to warn me before I got myself into trouble with him."

The ripples had mostly faded now, and though the image still wavered slightly she could see the crimson streaks drawn back through her dark hair, a certain reddish tinge in the reflection of her eyes; a soft breeze rustled through the trees, disturbing her image again and blowing a few stray locks across her cheek. "I suppose I talk too much," she sighed, tucking them back behind her ear. "Don't mind me and my idle thoughts--"

"What resemblance do you see between us?"

Glancing toward him, she found him staring out into the dark. "...you're like the moon," she offered, gesturing toward the sky. "Beautiful, but distant enough to seem unreachable. Calm to the point of seeming emotionless -- though you show more than she ever did. You don't speak if you don't have to...but even when you say nothing, there's a clear message if you pay attention."

"And what message is that?"

"From you?" she replied, reaching up to touch an earring only to remember that she no longer had them. "I have no idea. I knew Kanna: we were the first, and we survived longer than any of the others. I could understand what she was trying to get across, even when she didn't say a word. But you're not her: you remind me of her sometimes, enough that I get the sense there's something more...but what that is? I can only guess."

Silence. But she hadn't expected much more. Sighing to herself, she rose to her feet and dusted off her kimono--

"Your guess, then."

She paused, raising an eyebrow as she turned to find him looking to the sky; straightening again, she folded her arms, casting her own gaze up to the moon while she gathered her thoughts. "You find my company tolerable. Enough to keep me around, despite the hassle humans can be." Even if she wasn't quite that anymore. But the silence in his presence felt comfortable and easy, entirely unlike the tension of it from her former life where she was forever under watch, every action scrutinized and harshly judged.

Even now, having said so much, the quiet did not try to suffocate her. Canting her head slightly, she glanced over at him, a half-smile twitching at her lips. "...well? Am I close?" she asked.

He offered nothing more than a wordless hum in reply. She was hardly surprised by that...but she was not bothered by it, either. He had made no effort to either send her away or remove himself from the conversation, and even as the moon fell below the treetops and light stained the sky, he remained by her side.

Perhaps he enjoyed her company, as she did his. She couldn't be certain...but she was content to let him keep his secrets and his mysteries; if she stayed, she felt assured that they would become clearer in time.

\-----

They continued east, the weeks blurring one into the next as they made their way through forests and fields; while they still gave wide berth to the human settlements, that margin narrowed as more and more traces of mankind’s presence dotted the countryside they traveled. Kagura couldn't say she missed the frequent skirmishes with demons, but being so close to humans left her ill at ease, and the greater part of her looked forward to moving well beyond them once more. 

Sesshomaru, though, seemed in no hurry to leave mankind behind, and for once even Jaken voiced no complaints. At first she simply followed along, uneasy but willing to trust their judgment...but when they left the safety of the trees and took directly to the path leading into a village, she finally hesitated: what possible business could they have _here...?_

"Lord Sesshomaru!!"

A child's voice. One she recognized. 

Rin seemed little changed from the last time Kagura had drifted through the village as the wind. Perhaps a bit taller, with hair grown slightly longer, but she still recognized the girl that had ever followed at Sesshomaru's heels while Naraku's shadow stretched across the land. Skipping up the road, the child bounced to a stop a pace ahead of the demons, stretching her arms wide in greeting. "Welcome back, Lord Sesshomaru! Master Jaken," she added, smiling at the imp.

And then she turned to Kagura.

She saw the silent question in the cant of Rin's head, and reached for her the fan in her sleeve despite herself -- not in preparation to attack, but to steady herself. "Hello," the girl ventured, bowing slightly and folding her hands before her. "What brings you to the village, Miss?"

"Where is Kohaku," Sesshomaru interrupted.

Rin leapt to attention, rising up on the tips of her toes as she faced the demon. "He's here visiting with everyone! Did you come to see him, too?"

Sesshomaru made a sound that could have been anything from agreement to dismissal. The girl seemed to understand, though, beaming as she turned and started back down the path; the demon glanced over his shoulder at Kagura, his expression as calm and unreadable as ever, before following in the child's wake with Jaken in tow.

Kagura drew in a deep breath, held it fast...and let it out in a slow sigh. Whether she was ready for this or not -- and she felt anything but -- she saw no alternatives. None that would leave her without regrets, at least.

She had enough of those left over from her first life.

Trailing a few paces behind, she tucked her hands into her sleeves, gripping her fan tight to still her hands. Even now it surprised her, how peaceful the village was; she could still remember the early days after Naraku's defeat, crops and trees withered from the miasma, the ground cratered from fallen debris...if she'd not blown through and witnessed it for herself, she might never have known a cataclysm occurred here. Even at the brink of destruction, they had survived, recovered, and come to flourish again.

Ahead she saw Rin duck into one of the huts, and took another steadying breath. "Lady Kaede!" the girl called from just out of sight. "Lord Sesshomaru just arrived -- he's here to see Kohaku!" 

"Really, now? And what of the herbs I asked you to fetch?"

Kagura heard Rin gasp at the reminder and couldn't help but smile. "I'll be back, I promise!" Hurrying outside again, Rin offered an apologetic little nod before scampering back down the path, and Kagura turned to watch the child go, oddly amused by the whole exchange...

"Do you have need of me, Lord Sesshomaru?"

The young man that lifted the woven door was only vaguely familiar. While Rin had changed but little, Kohaku had grown almost beyond recognition; gone were the freckles and the roundness in his face, the youthful stature and the childish timbre of his voice -- he had come into his own since the last time she'd visited on the breeze.

The red-robed figure that followed him, however, was no different than her last memory. "Sesshomaru," InuYasha grumbled. And behind the half-demon came the rest: the priestess (dressed now in traditional white and red rather than the green of her old raiments), the little fox, the demon slayer, and the monk (though the babes in their arms and at their heels were new). 

"Why are you looking for Kohaku?" Sango asked, moving to pass the infant she held to her husband.

Sesshomaru stepped aside, glancing sidelong at Kagura while he did. And very suddenly, their attention shifted to _her._

"Hey, Kagome?" Shippo whispered. "Who's that lady?"

"I don’t sense demonic power -- did Sesshomaru bring her?" Miroku asked, his voice quiet but carrying all too well on the wind.

A wry half-smile twitched at her lips. "You don't recognize me?" she ventured, drawing the fan from her sleeve and flicking it open. "...well. I can't say I'm too surprised -- looks like I've changed more than you have."

Their confusion was almost tangible. She watched them exchange puzzled glances, trying to divine her identity from her face and voice...except for Kohaku, whose rapt attention focused on the fan instead. "...Kagura...?"

She smiled, feeling the breeze swirl gently past when she shuttered her instrument. "It's been a long time. Good to see you again."

For a moment there was silence, and she breathed in deep, wondering if they would need further proof as Sesshomaru had--

All at once five voices crashed over her, overlapping into a chaos of meaningless sound. Her brows rose in surprise, but she held steady, waiting for them to sort themselves out and focusing instead on Kohaku, who simply stared at her in shock. "Is...is it really you, Kagura?" he asked, taking one step toward her so that he could be heard over the din from the others. 

She inclined her head, toying with her fan to give her fingers something to do. "A different body, maybe. But the same wind. ...I'm glad you made it, Kohaku. You had me worried for a while." His laugh sounded slightly choked, and were those tears...?

She stumbled as something hit her from behind, arms grabbing her around the waist and holding fast. Her fan flared, sweeping high and drawing the wind with it in preparation to strike, and she heard her own voice snarl like a storm's gale in the trees as she gave her only warning: "Unhand me--!"

"You're back!!"

Her arm lowered as she stared down at Rin. The child she'd once kidnapped on Naraku's orders, who had no reason to bear her anything but mistrust if not ill will, now hugged her tight, pressing her face into Kagura's kimono to muffle her sobs. "I'm so glad you're back," she sniffled, peeking up with a tear-stained smile. "I'm so happy -- b-but how did you do it?"

"...ask Sesshomaru," she shrugged, hiding her smirk behind her fan while the demon shot her a pointed glare. He'd left her to explain her identity alone, and even though she couldn't imagine him offering much of an explanation for her presence now, she would gladly turn their attention toward him; she was not above petty vengeance for petty slights.

Rin released her at last, hurrying over to Sesshomaru's side. "Thank you, Lord Sesshomaru," the girl beamed...and though the demon said nothing, Kagura swore she saw his expression soften in the face of the child's grin. 

. -----

Kagura was more than a little surprised by the warm welcome she received from her former enemies. She'd expected that avoiding them would be in her best interests, after all the grief she'd once caused them; instead, they prepared a feast to welcome her -- and though she wasn't selfish enough to imagine that it was _all_ on her behalf, rather than held in honor of Kohaku's visit, she was still curiously touched that they invited her at all.

The food was different from what she'd grown accustomed to on their travels, and with Rin's encouragement (and occasional assistance, where the fox demon's favorites were involved) she attempted to try a bit of everything, all the while doing her best to either explain or evade the endless barrage of questions about how she'd returned to life, how she'd become human, why she looked so different from before, and so on, since -- as she'd expected -- Sesshomaru's terse answer referring to the Tenseiga had satisfied no one. While Kagome mostly took the notion in stride, InuYasha and Shippo seemed unsettled by the implications, the monk and the demon slayer fell into a heated debate about whether or not Kagura would be considered a human or a demon given the bizarre circumstances surrounding her revival...

Eventually she stopped trying to follow the conversations and simply let them flow around her. In her first life, she'd never given much thought to what things would be like after she claimed her freedom: she'd never known true peace, had no real concept of what it would be like, _could_ be like...but sitting amongst them all, listening to them laugh and squabble and converse without a care in the world...it felt easy. _Right_ , somehow, in a way she could neither understand nor place.

The sun set, but while the light-hearted atmosphere remained, Kagura drifted apart from it like a leaf on the breeze. Sesshomaru and the imp had taken up a post on the roof of the priestess' hut, and (perhaps unsurprisingly) she noticed Rin sitting beside him, apparently regaling the demons with the latest goings-on in the village. From her own place in the grass, she could still watch, hear the different voices, even pick out the words if she wanted, without being tied down by more inquiries...

"Do you mind if I join you?"

She glanced up at Kohaku as he approached from the shadows behind her, and gestured vaguely toward the place beside her in invitation. He offered an awkward sort of grin in return, sitting down and offering her a shallow cup. "Sake?" he ventured, holding up a jug in his other hand.

"Where did you come by that?" she asked, agreeably taking the dish.

"Miroku had it," he replied, pouring a bit into hers before filling his own. "But then my sister started lecturing him about drinking too much and leaving her to handle all three of the little ones on her own, so I _may_ have snuck it away while they weren't paying attention."

She cast a sly grin in his direction. "Have you ever had this before?"

"Uh...not yet," he confessed. "My sister keeps saying I'm not old enough, but she's always treating me like I'm still her baby brother, even though I've grown up!"

"I'll say," Kagura agreed, holding out her cup. "To growing up, then." Beaming, he lifted his own, and together they took a drink...

And shared a shudder. She coughed into her sleeve while Kohaku sputtered and tried to keep a straight face, doing her best not to laugh and knowing she failed when the boy gave her a baleful look. "Not what you expected?" she chuckled.

"I guess I don't know what I was expecting," he wheezed back, setting the jug aside with a look of abject betrayal. "I never...really thought I'd be doing this."

"What, drinking sake with an old enemy?" Kagura smirked.

His smile caught her off guard. "Drinking sake at all. Let alone with an old ally."

She had no reply for that. For a few moments more, they sat in silence, gazing up at the stars while the breeze whispered around them. "...I'm glad you made it out, Kohaku," she murmured. "You had me worried for a while."

"It's thanks to you," he replied.

She scoffed, casting a wry glance in his direction as she took up the bottle and poured herself another drink. "Please, you're giving me too much credit--"

"It's true, though!" he insisted. "If you hadn't sent me off and fought Hakudoshi yourself, I probably would have died right there -- and even before that, you kept me from taking my own life, gave me the courage to endure and play along and wait for a chance to strike. If not for you, I never would have met Lady Kikyo, or joined Lord Sesshomaru, or been able to make up with my sister, and...and after everything you did for me, I couldn't help you. I couldn’t even thank you."

There was a choked sound in his voice, like he was on the verge of tears. "You don't need to," she shrugged. "You lived: that’s all I wanted. I'm glad one of us did."

"...I'm sorry about Kanna," he mumbled, holding his cup out again.

She filled it without argument. "Me, too." They both lifted their sake up toward the moon in a silent toast before drinking it down; knowing what to expect this time, neither one flinched at the taste -- but she still set the jug aside, and he made no move to touch it again.

"...so how _are_ you here?" he asked after a moment. "I thought...Naraku..."

"He did," she agreed. "But I was always the wind. It's what I went back to being. I still had power, though: I could puppet a body if I tried hard enough. So I did, and eventually I crossed paths with Sesshomaru, and...I don't know what he did. Something with that sword--"

"The Tenseiga?" Kohaku offered.

She nodded, swilling the dregs of the sake in her cup. "I don't know what happened. But when I woke up, I was _in_ this body, rather than puppeting it."

"...is it what you wanted?"

"...I'm not sure I ever knew what I really wanted," she confessed, reaching up to toy with an earring she kept forgetting she had lost with her other life. "I wanted freedom when Naraku held my heart -- the freedom to go where I wanted and do what I wished without being forced to throw myself into danger on his orders -- but I never thought much beyond that. Living my own life by my own will: that was freedom to me. I never thought much about the details."

"Are you happy with this, though?"

"...I like it well enough. Having a human body takes some getting used to, but it's not so bad: Sesshomaru seems used to traveling with humans by now."

"I would hope so," Kohaku laughed. "...are you going to stay with Lord Sesshomaru?"

"For now," she agreed. "I owe this life to him. I'd rather not be indebted to anyone, especially not for something like that."

"...I don't think Lord Sesshomaru would hold you to honor it," he ventured. "He can seem harsh, but...I don't think he's ever expected someone to pay him back. Even when he saved me, he only told me not to get in the way, and he never asked for anything afterward."

Kohaku was right, of course: Sesshomaru had demanded nothing of her when he gave her this new life, and had asked for nothing since. "For my own peace of mind, then," she amended. It would put her at ease, knowing she'd cleared any possible obligation.

...and in the meantime, it gave her a reason to stay with him.

A movement caught her eye, and she watched Sesshomaru drift down from the rooftop with Rin in arms. Passing her wordlessly to Kagome, the demon turned his gaze toward Kagura -- and she rose from her place in the grass, dusting off her kimono while Kohaku scrambled to join her. "Are you leaving?"

"Looks that way," she nodded, tucking her hands into her sleeves and once again taking hold of her fan. "It was good to see you, Kohaku."

"I hope we can meet again soon," he agreed. "And hopefully it'll go this well next time, too -- you know, I'm kind of surprised that tonight was so calm, usually Kagome and InuYasha get into at least _one_ argument that ends with her saying--"

"InuYasha, _SIT!!"_

Something hit the ground nearby with a resounding _crack,_ loud enough to make Kagura jump. The half-demon snarled up at the priestess from his place sprawled on the ground, which she ignored completely, marching into the nearby hut (and Kagura sensed she would have slammed the door behind her, had there only been one).

"...looks like I spoke too soon," Kohaku sighed.

"Idiot," the little fox demon grumbled.

Kagura had to agree there.

"We're going," Sesshomaru said, a simple remark rather than an order.

"See you around, Kohaku," she chuckled, lifting her hand in a parting wave that he returned in kind. Turning away, she followed the shimmer of moonlight off the demon's fur down the dark path, out of the village, into the trees, and on until the last trace of torchlight vanished from sight.

\-----

They made their way back to the west, away from humans and into the wilds where the only trace of mankind's presence was in the old bones of those who'd lost their ways long ago. Encounters with demons became routine once more, and though not all ended with bloodshed, tensions still ran high more often than not when Sesshomaru caught an unfamiliar scent.

With every passing day, it became easier to read him. His cues were subtle enough to seem absent at a glance, but they spoke loud in the silence that prevailed over their travels: the stiffening of his clawed hands when he sensed a potential threat, the narrowing of his eyes when he detected a distant sound, the bristling of his fur when a demonic presence strayed too close...she learned to recognize them all, and responded wordlessly to each one without need for prompting -- something she was sure he'd noticed, judging from the way he glanced at her before a foe could so much as rear its head.

Trying to puzzle through the things on his mind was an entirely different challenge. Where combat was concerned, she needed only read the flow of his gestures to know which way to direct her attacks, what flank to guard, whether to aim high or sweep low; outside of it, he barely said two words in answer to a direct question (if he spoke at all). She could only guess at what thoughts kept him company in the dead of night as he sat awake on guard, his senses trained on their surroundings though his attention had clearly strayed. And she was fairly certain that _her_ half-baked ideas were wholly wrong.

It didn't stop her from wondering, though.

Maybe that was what kept her awake. Not every night, but certainly tonight, when the cold air felt too still and even the birds and bugs had gone silent. Jaken seemed to have had no trouble dozing off, and even as she picked herself up and retreated through the dry leaf litter the imp snored on undisturbed; Sesshomaru, though, simply stared off somewhere deep between the dark trees, sparing her the briefest glance when she approached before once more turning his gaze toward the distant unknown.

"Trouble sleeping?" she ventured, leaning against the rock he perched on. No answer -- not that she'd expected one. "Something on your mind that's keeping you awake, then?"

Still no response. But she saw him glance at her again, and forged ahead on the off-chance that this was a confirmation of some kind. "Want to talk about it?"

She thought she heard him scoff, and a wry grin twitched at her lips. "Only seems fair, if you ask me. You’ve listened to me ramble on -- not to mention taking me to see Kohaku again afterward. I'd be glad to return that favor, even if it's just the listening part."

The silence stretched, and she tilted her head back against the chill stone to watch him while he stared into the dark, reaching up again to touch an earring she no longer had -- a bad habit she still had yet to break. "You don't say a lot. But I doubt it's that quiet in your head. ...think of it like putting the words in there out here. I'll even promise not to say anything until you're done, if you like."

Silence. But she hadn’t expected much more. She still bit back a sigh, turning her gaze up to the canopy and the stars twinkling between gaps in the leaves...

"I wonder if I will ever truly match my father."

Glancing toward him, she was not surprised to find his attention focused elsewhere. But this was already more than she'd hoped for. So she kept her mouth shut, watching her breath billow into a silver plume of fog and listening for whatever other words he might speak.

"He was a great demon. Nearly unparalleled in might, powerful enough to hold dominion over the west. Demons flocked to him, either to challenge him in combat or offer their loyalty. Often enough one and then the other, if he deigned to spare their lives. But he was well-regarded by those who followed him. So much so that they were willing to pledge themselves to the cause of his son centuries after his death. ...I have surpassed my father in might: the Bakusaiga is proof enough of that. But strength alone is not sufficient to become Lord of the West -- and I lack my father's charm."

There was a bitterness in those words that drew her gaze up again, though he still seemed disinclined to meet her eye. "By rights, I should have become Lord of the West when my father died. But my only inheritance was the Tenseiga, and a blade unable to cut living beings is useless in battle. It set me down the path to pursue Tessaiga as a stolen birthright, and even though I was only able to realize my own power and surpass his strength after I abandoned such designs...might is but one part of rule -- and the only one that comes naturally to me.”

She watched her breath billow as the silence stretched on. And when she looked up, she caught his eye at last. "Is that why you keep the imp around?" she asked.

"He has his uses," Sesshomaru replied.

"He certainly knows how to extoll your virtues," she chuckled. "But that's not really what you're after. Sounds to me like you want to win allies to your side, rather than crushing everyone as enemies."

He made a vague noise, which she took to be agreement. "I can't say that I'm exactly diplomatic, either. You've seen me in action: I have a short temper on a good day and I'm quick to pull a weapon if I think trouble's possible. I suppose that's the problem: we're all hopeless at the one thing that's most needed."

"On the contrary: I think you'd be well-suited for it."

She stopped. Another glance confirmed that he'd turned his attention away again, but the undercurrent of _praise_ in that remark was still enough to stun her. "And what makes you think that?"

"How long you lived without your heart."

Kagura scoffed, flicking her fan open and stirring a cold breeze. "Oh, so being able to survive Naraku qualifies me to be diplomatic?"

"You survived while rebelling against him. That is a feat."

...that, admittedly, was a fair point. She'd made early missteps that taught her how to crush her anger and tread lightly, and soon enough learned how to play along on the surface while influencing others around her in subtler ways. "Point taken," she conceded. "So maybe I'll take the lead in our next encounter. See if I can't coerce some demons into being friendly -- after I prove I'm not the human they mistake me for, of course."

"It took my father a thousand years to establish his control of the western lands," Sesshomaru pointed out. Not a rebuke: just a remark.

"Well, even he had to start somewhere," she shrugged. He seemed thoughtful, if nothing else. "Might as well be tomorrow, and in that case I should try to sleep so I can have my wits about me. Wouldn't want to ruin things before they can get started."

Tucking her fan away again, she lifted her hand in a parting wave and started toward the glow of the fire. Rest would do her human body the most good, given that she had no way to plan for what they might face next...

"Rest well."

She stopped in her tracks, turning to look over her shoulder at him; she'd have sooner believed it a trick of the wind through the leaves, but the air was so still...

He was looking at her.

In the next instant he'd turned his gaze elsewhere, but she was _sure_ of what she'd seen. Inclining her head all the same, she picked her way through the dry leaves once more, adding a bit more wood to the fire to fight back the night's chill before curling up to rest again.

Or try to, at least -- an effort made that much harder by the memory of golden eyes seared into her mind, and the question of what it _meant_ swirling at the edges of her thoughts.

\-----

Time moved differently for demons. A year was nothing at all to something that could live for a thousand or more. Or perhaps it was just that, after a point, they had more time behind them, and so ceased to pay mind to its passage. But Kagura was keenly aware of the days, weeks, months, _years_ flowing by; she was comparatively young, in the grand scheme of things, had barely lived a year in Naraku's clutches before dying, and then passed another...three? four? on the wind before her new life in human form began. She'd weathered winter's cold and summer's heat, relished spring's flowers and fall's colors, and still each season felt new to her when it returned, rather than being simply one more part of life's endless repetition.

Then again, she'd died once already: she knew well that there was, in truth, an end to the cycle.

But it surprised her all the same when she realized two years had gone by since her return to life. In that time Sesshomaru had begun to build a new reputation among the demons in the west -- not as one to avoid for fear of their lives, but as one on his way to establishing stability among the many and varied clans inhabiting those lands. And in some small way, she was part of that change: by listening, speaking on his behalf, acting as an intermediary, and occasionally leveraging his strength to coerce the less agreeable ones into compliance (with his permission, of course), she was helping pave the way toward his ambition.

Perhaps that was why she felt so frustrated now, limping her way painfully across the uneven ground. And however much she might want to fault something else, there was no one to blame but herself: the band of monks that had ambushed them was hardly a threat, for all their posturing, but a careless misstep -- too much of her attention on the flow of the wind, not enough on the earth below -- had brought her down, her ankle twisting painfully beneath her. Sesshomaru had forced them back, but the damage was done, and no matter how insistently she told herself that she was _fine,_ there was no denying that she was anything but. It was a wonder she hadn't been left behind long before.

The only reasonable explanation was that Sesshomaru had measured his pace to compensate for her. But she doubted his patience would last long.

She heard the river long before they reached its banks, and while it was tempting to hurry on toward it, the risk of falling again and causing herself further injury was too great; instead she maintained her painstaking hobble until the stream came into view, using whatever tree or rock she could find for support before crumpling at last onto the damp stones. The water felt bitingly cold against her skin when she submerged her injured leg -- but the chill was a blessing in itself, numbing the pain to a lingering ache.

Sesshomaru's voice sounded somewhere behind her. "Jaken."

"Yes, Milord?"

"Prepare a fire."

"At once, Milord!" She heard the imp scamper off into the undergrowth...and then the sound of footsteps approaching, soft but somehow deafening in the stillness.

"No need for that," she muttered, wincing as she touched her swollen ankle. "I won't be long."

"You were injured."

"I'm fine," she insisted, staring down at the swift-moving water (and even there, she avoided his wavering image). "We still have a lot of ground to cover tonight--"

"You should rest."

Despite the words he chose, she heard the command in his tone; hunching forward, Kagura pressed her fists to the smooth stone beneath her. "It's nothing serious. I'll be fine in a few minutes..."

"Even a demon needs time to heal."

She scoffed, turning away from him to look further downstream. "A _demon_ wouldn't need to heal from something so paltry."

He had no ready response to that. 

But he did not leave, either. Out of the corner of her eye, she could still see him reflected in the water, seeming closer now than she had ever known him to stand and stay. Jaken returned with the first armload of kindling, then retreated again for more, and still Sesshomaru did not move. 

"Damn this weak body," she hissed. In her first life (without her heart), she'd taken mere hours to recover from being pierced clean through -- something like _this_ never would have happened, or stopped her for more than a moment if it had. "What _good_ am I if the smallest thing is enough to stop me in my tracks -- how can I make myself _useful_ if I can't keep up!?"

She heard him stir and closed her eyes, grimly certain that when he took his leave he would not return again...

"Kagura."

He did not speak her name often; when he did, there was usually an order in it, whether it be ceding a situation to her control or warning her to back away from what threatened to be a violent encounter. But she heard nothing of the sort now, and that alone caught her so off guard that she turned toward him despite her fervent intention to look anywhere else.

She found him kneeling beside her on the damp rock, so close that the fur curled over his shoulder rustled when she breathed. And before she could retreat, he reached out to her, his hand pausing a mere inch from touching her cheek, near enough that she could feel its warmth against her skin. "I do not value your presence solely for the aid you provide."

Even the rushing river beside them seemed to quiet at those words.

Tentatively, she lifted her own hand, chill from the stone and the water, and let it hover over his. Not quite touching, giving him the same chance to draw back that he had given her, and that she had deferred with this silent gesture.

He moved, his palm cupping her cheek; her own hand followed it, holding his fingers there as she leaned her head lightly into that unfamiliar touch. "Not for the debt I owe?" she ventured.

"You owe me nothing," he replied. "You never have."

There was a subtle implication in those words that made her heart race. "What are you saying?" she asked, determined to avoid any possible misinterpretation.

"Rest," he ordered. But he did not remove his hand from beneath hers. "We will stay here until you've healed."

"...alright," she conceded quietly. At last he withdrew, and she lowered her arm, letting her fingers curl again atop the cold stone. Rather than depart, he remained beside her...and after a moment, the long fur that trailed behind him curled loose around her, soft and warm enough to push back the water's chill.

Somewhere behind them, she heard Jaken arrive with his second armload of kindling, drop it, babble something she did not catch, and beat a hasty retreat. But she paid that no mind at all: however brief this moment might prove to be, she intended to treasure every instant.


	3. Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kagura can't help but liken it to courtship, this curious back-and-forth, give-and-take she has with Sesshomaru. After a particularly vicious encounter with another demon, it slips into something like marriage -- and with it, the unexpected promise of new life, even as her second chance nears an end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yet more embellishments because the only way I know how to write relationships is slowly. Extra bonus points if you can guess what the demon in this chapter is based on. ;) 
> 
> As before, dashes (-) represent a change of scene; in addition, asterisks (*) represent a change of perspective. Enjoy!

Long ago now, Kagura had likened it to a dance: every subtle glance, every quiet gesture, all part of some unspoken and ultimately unknown ritual she could only guess at. As they came to trust one another more, they drew closer, the steps circling ever inward until...

That touch. The final space between them, once seeming so vast, cleared in an instant. And with that one gesture, insignificant yet somehow monumental, the dance changed. 

Sesshomaru had always been true to his word: when he said that he would wait, she believed him. But she worried even so when she woke alone by the fire, still bright enough to crackle though the wood was near to crumbling. Her ankle ached, and she roused herself enough to hobble to the water's edge to soak it again, relieved that it at least held her weight better than it had the night before. 

Something rustled in the brush behind her, and she glanced over her shoulder to see Jaken tumble out of the bushes with another armload of kindling. "I see you're finally awake," he muttered.

"Good morning to you, too," she smirked. If the imp was still here, she could be sure his lord would return soon enough.

She did not hear him bustle off again, but did not bother turning to look, either. Once the pain in her leg settled, she carefully picked herself up from the stony bank and made her way gingerly back to the fire. It was at least warmer there than it was by the river...though nowhere near as warm as it had been the night before, lost in that impossibly soft fur. She'd fallen asleep in it, from what little she remembered -- apparently deeply, since she did not recall him leaving. How long had he stayed, she wondered, looking through the rustling leaves toward the soft blue of the sky above...

And more importantly, what came next?

The sun climbed high overhead and began its descent with no sign of the demon's return. Though Jaken began to mutter and grumble to himself more and more as the hours wore on, Kagura was content to wait, intermittently soaking her ankle in the chill river and watching the spray glitter in the afternoon light. Patience was learned: she'd taken those hard lessons to heart long ago, and though she had no real _faith_ in anything...well. Sesshomaru had given her no reason to distrust him in all the time she'd known him; she saw no reason to start now.

The sun had nearly set by the time the demon returned, floating down through a break in the canopy and landing on the stony bank. While the imp rushed to greet his master. Sesshomaru flatly ignored him, making his way instead to the place where Kagura sat among the tangled roots of a nearby copse of trees. Something about this felt oddly familiar: the bundle he carried, the way he knelt to lay it at her side...but rather than retreat this time, he remained near, rising to his feet and looking out over the river while she took the parcel and opened it.

The first item that greeted her was wrapped in thin bark and tied with twine; once she worked the knot loose, it bloomed open on its own, revealing several broad green leaves and a large clamshell that, on closer inspection, contained a pale green (and slightly noxious-smelling) ointment. "Medicine?" she ventured.

"From Rin," he said, which she took for agreement, "for swelling."

"I'll have to thank her the next time we pass through," she chuckled. It still shocked her to know how eager the girl was to help someone that had been her enemy, caused her distress and placed her in danger (even if Kagura hadn’t harmed the child outright)...but, agreeably, she applied the salve and wrapped her ankle in the cool leaves before setting the bark aside.

The second item was far stranger, and clearly not from the village where his ward now stayed; apparently he had gone several places during his long absence. The lacquered wooden box on its own was a work of art, with ivory and mother-of-pearl swallows dancing among the delicately engraved leaves and branches...but it was what she found inside that made her heart skip a beat.

The jade seemed to glow in the fading sunlight. She recognized the way they clustered together, connected by threads and bands of silver: a hairpin at the center, two large stones with a pair of white feathers pinned between them...and an earring to either side, five beads apiece descending in size and tipped with feathers -- white, rather than the black she had once known.

"You need not accept them, if they are not to your liking."

Those words, too, were familiar. But even as he spoke them she freed her hair, ran her comb through it, and wound it into a high, tight coil, securing it with the pin before donning the earrings. The weight felt so familiar to her, so _right_ in a way she could not find words to express...it was like a piece of herself had returned at last, though she had never realized it was missing to begin with.

"Thank you," she murmured, reaching up to touch the feathers tucked against her hair; she doubted that these would grow as the others had in her former life, but she appreciated that symbol of her freedom all the same.

Sesshomaru said nothing. Instead he settled among the same roots, the long trail of fur wrapping around him, close enough to touch...and when she reached out, brushing her knuckles lightly against it, the ruff coiled loose around her once again. Jaken, seeming flustered, babbled something about fetching more wood before promptly excusing himself and scampering off through the brush, leaving them alone to watch the setting sun fall beneath the treetops to cast soft shadows across the nearby river stones.

"Now that you know you have no debt to repay, what will you do? Where will you go, once you are well enough to travel?" he asked at last.

"Oh, who knows," she shrugged. "Wherever the wind takes me, I suppose."

She caught his glance from the corner of her eye. "I plan to continue west toward the coast," he remarked. 

Casually drawing her fan, Kagura flicked it open, feeling the breeze shift toward the setting sun with a lazy sweep of her wrist. "Hm. What do you know? Seems the wind is going that way, too."

For just a moment, she swore a smile crossed his face, there and gone before she could blink. But she said nothing at all, instead leaning toward him...and feeling that soft fur welcome her, drawing her into its warmth long before the night's chill set in.

\-----

Kagura still had no name for that first dance, though that hardly seemed to matter anymore. It had not been meaningless -- far from it -- and yet, she felt no driving need to define what had come before. Instead, as ever, she looked ahead to what came next: to her life, to travel...and to this strange new ritual that now wove through their days.

At first, there were more gifts: new kimonos in fine silk with elaborate patterns, necklaces and bracelets and rings made from gold or silver and studded with precious stones...and while they were beautiful, to be sure, treasures and works of art one and all, she turned them away. She had no need for such things while they were traveling, so she saw no value in dragging them along. Her gratitude and ultimate refusal seemed to puzzle him, and after a few such attempts, he stopped.

She was not idle, herself, though. At every quiet opportunity, she tested the limits of how close she could venture without driving him off, how long she could linger before he took his leave. From walking a few steps behind in their daily wanderings, she quietly advanced until they were nearly side by side; from allowing him to retreat to the periphery of their resting places each evening, she followed him outside the ring of firelight, settling near enough to touch should he wish it. He seemed uncomfortable with such closeness, from everything she'd gathered in their time together. She respected that: she could hardly say that she found such displays easy, herself. 

But she wanted this. Those small, brief moments of contact, of _intimacy,_ had thrilled her in ways she could not put words to. She yearned for more -- and she was willing to push her own boundaries to get it, even as she explored his.

With every passing day, their limits seemed to relax. And so the dance drew them closer, one step at a time, circling ever inward. 

It was quiet tonight, and warm enough that there was no need even for a fire. Sitting beside him in the dark, she gazed up at the shimmering stars in the sky overhead; despite the hour, with the moon nearly full she could see with almost startling clarity, and watched the light rippling across the grass with every gentle breath of wind. It was peaceful here, devoid of either human settlements or demon dens...folding her arms atop her raised knees, she closed her eyes, listening to the songs of insects somewhere in the distant dark...

"What is it that you seek?"

She stirred, glancing up at the demon standing beside her. "That's a vague question. You'll need to be more specific," she pointed out.

"From me," he added, seeming to think that clarified anything.

Sighing to herself, she lay her head on her crossed arms. "What makes you think I want something from you?"

"You seem...insistent, of late, when it comes to seeking me out."

So he _had_ noticed. That was an encouraging enough sign, she supposed. "I enjoy your company," she replied, "but it's not that easy to do from so far away. Does it bother you?"

He made a quiet noise that could have meant anything, though she (perhaps selfishly) took it for denial. "To what end?"

"...I don't know." Truthfully, she wasn't sure she _had_ a goal. She'd been drawn to him in her first life, initially because she believed his strength and skill might save her, though later...well. Even before her death, she had been rather enamored, for reasons even she could not fully understand. Following him for the past two years and more, she'd sought to understand him at least a bit more, to discover what lay beneath his ever-calm expression. But these latest attempts...they were something different. Something more. Something she had no name for. 

"My life is my own now. I can go wherever I want -- wherever the wind takes me. And I want to see more of the world, in ways that let me touch it rather than simply pass through unseen. But...just as much as I want that, I want to see you succeed in your ambitions. It's...strange. I was willing to put Kohaku's life before my own, once, knowing that it would likely mean my death -- but this...this is _different_. I care about you," she offered. It was true, in every sense of the word she knew. "You're important to me, in ways that have drawn me back to you time and time again, even when I had no body and no voice. ...I want to be near you."

He knelt beside her, and when she turned toward him she found his full attention on her. "Speak plain: what is it that you want?"

Speaking seemed to be half of her trouble. Sighing, she turned to face him fully, lifting both her hands...and when he did not withdraw, she took his face gently between them. He stirred slightly at the touch, seeming briefly as uncertain as she herself was -- but when he still did not retreat, she leaned close, her forehead briefly resting against the moon on his brow...before she tilted her head, her lips brushing gently across his.

She had no word for the feeling that fluttered within her breast. But she hoped the message was clear.

He did not recoil from the touch, which she took to be as good a sign as any. Sitting back, Kagura tucked her hands into her kimono sleeves, fingers toying idly with the fan she kept tucked there. She was still smiling to herself when she turned her gaze back to the silvered fields spreading out beyond them, rippling and swaying beneath the dancing wind...

Soft fur wrapped around her, light and cool where it brushed against her skin. Perhaps she had been clear enough, after all; leaning into that touch, she closed her eyes, breathing deep the scent of summer and letting it soothe her mind, lulling her first into an easy drowse...and finally into a quiet, restful dream.

Kagura stirred with the first light of sunrise warming her skin...and found the same fur curled close about her. 

That alone startled her fully awake. She had never seen him sleep -- as far as she knew, he had no need for it -- and when she turned her head up to look at him, she found him awake and watching the light through the distant trees.

He had stayed.

The fluttering in her chest only grew stronger, knowing that.

Preparing for the day's travel was a simple enough process most days, swiftly begun and finished with equal speed. She had long ago grown accustomed to tending such matters, knowing that Sesshomaru would inevitably set off before the fire had been properly extinguished and that she would catch up in short enough order...but when she turned from the familiar tasks this morning, she found that she was not alone. Both demons stood nearby, Jaken looking as impatient as ever while his master fixed his gaze on something far in the distance.

"Were you waiting for me, for once?" she grinned, moving to join them.

"Which way will you go today?" Sesshomaru asked.

"Whichever way the wind blows," she replied, withdrawing her fan and flicking it open.

"Which way does it blow today?"

The fluttering in her chest faded away, and her teasing smile with it. She had gone too far again, it seemed, been too bold in her own aims...but it had been a risk from the start. She'd known that from the moment she chose to take the chance. Breathing a slow sigh, she made a quick, elegant gesture with her wrist, twirling the fan with ease and drawing the wind around them into a slow spiral...before snapping her instrument closed, sending the gale swirling off through the field and into the trees left of the rising sun. "North, it seems," she murmured. "Autumn should be coming that way soon, I'd imagine. It'll be nice to see the colors and the leaves changing."

He made a quiet sound that might have been agreement. But no parting gesture. No goodbye. Tucking her fan back into her sleeve, she turned to go...

He stepped up beside her. She paused, looking up at him -- and he, in turn, glanced down at her.

"I will follow the wind today," he said.

She might have sworn her heart had grown wings, for how swiftly it beat within her breast.

Taking her first step, she saw him match her stride. And then the next. And the next. And together, side by side, they walked toward the distant forest and the mountains far beyond.

\-----

_Courtship._ That was the name of this new dance. 

Kagura wasn't sure why that word felt so fitting for this. But it was the one that came to mind most often now as they danced: an elaborate, unspoken ritual of give and take, ebb and flow, advance and retreat, drawing one another in with each step. This was not something she had learned in her first life, that much was certain: perhaps it came from this body she'd borrowed, instead, some deep-rooted understanding of human customs rising unbidden among her other scattered thoughts. 

Summer gave way to fall, and in that deepening chill closeness became more familiar. Fall gave way to winter, and in the driving snow and bitter cold touch became more commonplace. They still had their limits, found through careful testing of the other's boundaries -- but that was ever calm, even _easy,_ compared to the days that brought endless trials of their strength and mettle. Nothing overwhelming, rarely enough for Sesshomaru to even bother with his blade...but trying all the same.

Winter gave way to spring, and something in the mountains stirred.

They felt it long before they saw it. It wasn't just the vibrations through the earth, but the _presence_ of it that raised the hair on the back of her neck; by the time she gave in to instinct and took tight hold of her fan, Sesshomaru had moved smoothly out ahead of her and the imp to greet whatever threat now bore down upon them.

She might have mistaken it for a rockfall at first glance, if not for the fact that it was moving. The massive earth-toned bulk did not slither so much as _crawl_ through the valley toward them, scales the size of boulders seeming to seethe and roil as it approached -- and once it came close enough, a wedge-shaped head rose up off the ground, slitted eyes blinking down at them while its heavy top bobbed and wove on what might have passed for a neck on something less serpentine.

"What fool demon dares enter my territory?" the demon demanded in a voice like an avalanche.

"I am Sesshomaru," he announced, his voice clear and calm as it echoed up and down the valley.

"Sesshomaru," the mountain rumbled, each syllable reduced to gravel under its forked tongue. "Bold, but not too bright."

Jaken, for once, seemed to have forgotten his usual bravado in the face of this monstrous creature; Kagura watched Sesshomaru step forward again, putting more distance between himself and his companions even as the space between the two great demons closed. "I think that's our cue," she muttered, nudging the imp while she sidestepped toward the rough canyon walls, never once letting her gaze stray from the snake's head (and feeling sure that its slitted eyes followed her every move just as closely).

Still, Sesshomaru's voice rang clear through the heavy air. "I have no business with you."

"And I have no use for your words,” The beast's rumbling laughter nearly shook Jaken's feet out from under him. "Long have I slept, and now that I have woken again I crave a meal to sate my appetite. I cannot recall the last time I feasted upon dog -- let us see if it tastes better than I remember."

The demon's slit pupils flared wide before she could draw the fan from her sleeve; by the time she'd flicked it open, the mountainous beast had already struck, boulders surging up from where its head had driven down into the rocky ground. How could something so _big_ be so _fast?_

Sesshomaru, though, was faster. She could see him floating over the demon's head long before it pulled itself up, shaking rubble from its pitted scales. "Perhaps I've gotten a bit slow, during all that sleep," it hissed. 

"Maybe an appetizer will perk me up."

The monster was on top of them before she could blink. If her fan hadn't been open in her hand already, she'd have never made it in time -- and even with it there and ready, the wind she pulled around them only _barely_ deflected the jet of venom that would have reduced them to boneless sludge, judging by what was left of the nearby rocks that had taken the brunt of the attack in their stead.

She doubted they would get that lucky again.

Grabbing the back of Jaken's collar, she jumped away, using another fierce gust to propel them further than her human body could manage on its own -- and narrowly avoiding a second attack, which left a smoking pit in the stones where they'd stood an instant before. 

If she'd still had her power to enchant feathers, they might have had a chance of escaping. But before they could even land, she saw the snake's pupils flare, the jaws gape wide, the fangs extend...

Suddenly they were flying.

She felt the wind rush past as Sesshomaru soared into the air with them in tow, bouncing from one side of the canyon to the other with the monstrous demon ever at their heels, lunging and _leaping_ in pursuit; when they finally landed on a high outcrop above even the snake's impressive reach, the imp tumbled to the stones with a wretched groan, clearly worse for the wear after the rough journey.

"Stay here," Sesshomaru ordered, drawing his runed sword as the cliffside trembled from the impact of the snake's massive body against the stones below--

"You're hurt."

He didn't look at her. But he couldn't hide the streaks of seared and smoking fur marring his long ruff. She'd never seen _anything_ potent enough to leave a mark on him, aside from the Tessaiga -- what _was_ that monster down there?

_"Stay here,"_ he growled again.

"You can't go out there alone!" Kagura snapped back.

"I won't have you getting in the way," he snarled. _"Stay here."_

He gave her no further chance to protest. She rushed to the edge as he leapt over the side, dropping to her knees when the stones shook beneath her feet and threatened to send her tumbling back down into the canyon; below, she saw the mountain demon turn its attention away from the walls, chasing after the sweeping green arc of Sesshomaru's sword that left no visible dent in the beast's thick scales, let alone the hide beneath. 

"Why did he go _back!?"_ she muttered, clutching at the worn rocks.

"Lord Sesshomaru's honor would never recover if he fled from a fight," Jaken mumbled, crawling on his belly to peer into the valley below. "Especially against such a powerful foe."

And if his reputation suffered, there went that 'Lord of the West' business, she supposed. Damn these demons and their egos.

"Stay here," she said, flicking her fan open and closed a few times while she surveyed the wall below. She doubted she could make the trip down in one jump without breaking something -- but if she used the wind to cushion her fall in smaller steps on the way down...

"You're leaving!?"

Kagura looked down at the imp suddenly clutching the hem of her kimono. " _Someone's_ got to make sure he survives this," she huffed. "And I'm the only one who stands any chance of dodging." However slim that might be.

After a moment's hesitation, Jaken released her, pressing his forehead to the ground as he bowed. "Please come back in one piece," he begged. "Lord Sesshomaru will have my head if you're hurt."

"You flatter me with your concern," she chuckled. And then she jumped, sweeping the fan in a low arc as she spun through the air. The wind wrapped around her, slowing her descent long before she approached the next outcrop; landing was easier than she'd expected -- but the fight below was still raging, and growing more heated by the moment from the look of it. As she drifted down to the next platform, a howl shook the heavens; the giant dog demon responsible lunged out of the air, pouncing on the snake and fixing its jaws around the monster's neck while she floated ever closer to the canyon floor. Smart: as thick as the creature was, it couldn't possibly wrap its body around his to crush the life out of him--

The instant that thought occurred to her, the beast proved them both wrong. It did not bother trying to coil and constrict the dog: instead it heaved its bulk up and _slammed_ it against Sesshomaru's body with enough force to dislodge the demon's grip.

And in a flash, the serpent rolled back onto its belly and lunged, sinking its fangs into the dog's bare shoulder.

Kagura didn't bother looking for another platform to get down. She jumped, pulling the wind around her into a whipping maelstrom so fierce it left her hovering high above the valley floor, tearing shards of stone from the walls and whipping them down at the snake. Perhaps not much of a weapon against those thick scales -- but more than enough of a distraction: it turned its attention up toward the sudden hailstorm, and Sesshomaru tore free of its jaws, lunging into the air before it could strike again.

The gale faded as the dog demon rushed through the air toward her, and when she reached out she felt his trailing ruff beneath her hand. Gripping it tight, she held fast while he raced through the narrow valley, leaping from wall to wall to avoid the lunging beast at his heels. Her hand tensed on her fan when she glanced ahead at the narrowing canyon walls: soon it would become too tight for him to pass, and they'd have nowhere to go...

Now or never.

"Get it to show its belly again!" she yelled over the wind. The dog demon turned its head, fringed tongue lolling; hopefully he had understood the words.

She let go, calling up a gust to carry her down to the valley floor. Overhead, Sesshomaru planted all four paws solidly on the nearest wall and lunged at the serpent rearing up over her, his jaws fastening on its neck again and dragging them both down to the rocky ground.

"Dance of the Dragon!"

How long had it been since last she'd done this dance? She could not recall anymore. But as Kagura raised her fan, the wind followed, twisting into a howling gale that stretched to the clifftops high above...and when she snapped it closed, the twister roared down upon the demons, raking the serpent from tail to chin -- and tearing loose its protective belly plates, one after another.

The monster bellowed, thrashing furiously out of the dog demon's grip. _"HOW DARE YOU WRETCHED VERMIN DESECRATE THE LORD OF THE MOUNTAINS!! I WILL DEVOUR YOU BONES AND ALL, YOU FILTHY--"_

Kagura wasn't sure whether those were the monster's death throes or earnest threats. It didn't matter, in the end: before it could make good on them, the great dog disappeared -- and in the place of that giant form, Sesshomaru drew his sword again and sliced the snake open from belly to breast. It still twitched a few times, its last low groan rattling through the earth beneath their feet...but at last it fell still and silent, toxic ichor spreading in a dark pool around it.

"...well, that was fun," Kagura scoffed, tucking her fan away into her sleeve. "Let's not do that again anytime soon."

Sesshomaru gave no indication that he had even heard her. As she approached, she could see the blood dripping from his left arm, heard him draw a ragged breath...

He took one step and wavered.

Grabbing his right arm to steady him, she looked up...into wide red eyes, their gaze unfocused, staring somewhere far beyond her or anything else in this world. Just how potent _was_ that venom, if it could do something like _this_ to him...?

She could think about that later. "We need to get out of here," she declared, securing her grip on his arm and pulling him away from the demon's corpse. Ideally it would be best to get far away from this battleground -- but she doubted she could carry both of them on the wind alone, and Sesshomaru was unlikely to be going far on his own anytime soon. With no other recourse, she pulled him backward, toward the place where the valley narrowed into what she hoped was not a dead end. 

Luck was, at least in part, on her side. Even at its closest point, the valley never fully sealed, and though coaxing the dazed demon along was a tediously slow process, she managed to find a sheltered spot to rest not far from where the walls began to widen again. Judging by the twisted little tree growing slightly higher up on the cliff face, it seemed likely that there was even water nearby, and where there was water there was a chance she could find plants to forage.

Though that could wait, at least for now. She was exhausted, weary from her bones to her deepest core; as soon as she saw Sesshomaru settled as comfortably as she could manage with his trailing fur wrapped close around him, she collapsed by his side, leaning into his uninjured shoulder and letting sleep carry her off.

It was dark by the time she roused again, pale moonlight frosting every facet of stone she could see. Despite the fact that she'd done comparatively little throughout the fight (at least when measured against the dog demon’s contribution), she _ached_ when she finally stirred from her place beside him. Creaking to her feet, she couldn't help but wonder why _she_ hurt when none of the damn wounds had been hers--

Something caught her wrist.

Looking down, she saw Sesshomaru's hand on her arm. He looked little better than when they'd stopped, though with his eyes now closed, she at least couldn't say he looked _worse_ than he had before. But it seemed strange even to her that he would hold her back -- especially when he was in this state; if demonic pride could be so easily injured by retreating from an ill-matched fight, she couldn't _imagine_ how badly bruised their egos were when someone saw them _wounded_...

"Stay."

The word was softer than the breeze floating by them. "I'll only be a minute," she murmured. Perhaps a few more, depending on how long it took to find that stream--

His grip tightened just enough for the tips of his claws to prick at her skin. "Stay," he repeated, little more than a whisper in the dark.

Sighing to herself, Kagura crouched down, resting her chin in her free hand. "And where exactly do you think I'm going to go?" she mused. ...admittedly, she would have to rescue Jaken at some point, but she wasn't sure she could manage that _quite_ yet--

"Where the wind takes you."

He opened his eyes, still red but for the thinnest sliver of blue. And it struck her, suddenly and fiercely enough to steal her breath.

He was worried that she would leave and not return.

Carefully withdrawing her fan, she flicked it open...and made a quelling gesture, stilling the air around them. The silence was strange, even disquieting, after growing so used to the wind's song -- but she smiled all the same as she closed her instrument once more and tucked it out of sight. "Feel that?" she murmured. "There is no wind."

His grip eased as she brushed the backs of her fingers across his jaw. "Rest," she insisted, touching her forehead to the moon on his brow. "I'll be here."

He released her at last, and she caught his hand rather than let it fall, laying it over his chest. Picking her way around their temporary shelter, she finally located a thin trickle of water dripping from a narrow cleft in the rocks, and patiently gathered enough in her hands to slake her thirst...before she returned, just as she'd promised, leaning once more into his uninjured side and listening to his quiet breaths.

The wind would return, eventually. It always did. But until he was well enough to leave this place, she would ensure that it remained still.

\-----

It took him time to recover. But he managed it, through some combination of Tenseiga's power, his own strength, and sheer force of indomitably stubborn will. She didn't know which to credit more, and in the end, she supposed it didn't matter all that much: the fact of it was that he survived. He healed. 

And he never asked her to leave. 

It had been strange, at first, how he watched her whenever she left their shelter for food or water or to drive off the weaker demons leaving their dens and burrows now that the so-called ‘Lord of the Mountain’ had met its end. He never followed, trusting her to manage on her own (or to call for him, if she couldn’t)...but something about the knowledge that he awaited her return left her chest feeling warm and strangely full. 

They talked as he mended, various things of varying importance. Sesshomaru spoke here and there of battles he’d weathered, both before and after her first death, of Rin and how they had come to travel together, of Kohaku’s brief time under his protection before Naraku’s fall. In turn, she told him of her time as the wind, laughing to herself as she spoke of the odd gifts of leaves and flowers she’d blown into his path...but he startled her into silence when he asked about the feather, and whether she had been responsible for that. 

“It reminded me of you,” he said. 

She had no name for the emotion those words stirred within her. 

Though they likely could have set out sooner, they delayed an extra day or so to ensure that his strength had returned in full. One final night alone with only the other’s company -- and within it, a moment where the boundaries between them blurred and disappeared, leaving only warmth and shared breaths that unraveled beneath each touch. 

They returned for Jaken the following morning. And when they did, she flew with him, settled comfortably in his trailing fur.

Summer had arrived long before they finally escaped the mountains, the drone of cicadas welcoming them at last into the northern foothills. They had managed to avoid any other perilous encounters through the long journey -- but she still breathed a sigh of relief when bare rock at last gave way to thick mats of fallen leaves beneath lush green trees. Despite the fact that the sun hadn't even reached its height, she still paused by the first winding creek they found, settling in the cool shade by the bank and cupping her hands in the water, first to drink and next to wet her face and neck. It wasn't much, next to the heat, but it helped a bit--

"Is everything alright, Lady Kagura?"

She frowned, glancing down at the imp. "Alright, that's it. Why all the formality?"

"Beg pardon, Milady?"

"What's with all this 'Milady' business?" she demanded, tapping his beak with the flat of her fan. "It used to be you couldn't say two words to me without grumbling, but after that business with the giant snake you've been nothing but pleasant. Why the sudden change?"

For a second, Jaken looked confused,glancing between her and the dog demon nearby. "Forgive me, Milady -- t-that is to say...are you not wedded now to Lord Sesshomaru?"

"Is that what we are?" she asked, turning to look up at the dog demon. Her grasp on the concept of marriage was weak, at best, even when it came to the human ritual; was that harrowing ordeal some prerequisite to demonic engagement? Or was it what came after -- the recovery, where he asked her to remain with him, entrusting his safety to her ability? Trust did not come easy to demons; it never had to her, at least. Or was it that last night they had spent together, that still burned ember-bright within her memory...

Sesshomaru looked back at her, a subtle question in his eyes. "...I don't mind it," she admitted softly, trailing her hand again through the water. "But it's still strange, suddenly being 'Milady' when it used to be you couldn't even manage my name without scowling."

While the imp sputtered through a halfhearted excuse, she splashed her face and neck again before once more taking to her feet...and for a moment, she simply held there, breathing in the warm, sweet air while the wind whispered past, tugging at something deep within her core...

"Kagura."

Stirring from her daze, she found Sesshomaru by her side, watching her so intensely that she nearly stumbled under the weight of his gaze. "It's nothing," she insisted, flicking her fan open and closed a few times. "...just tired."

Which was not unusual anymore. The fight against that mountain serpent had left her utterly exhausted, and while she'd mostly recovered in the weeks that followed, the fatigue had come creeping back in the last month of their journey. Most days she'd been able to push through, if somewhat slower than usual, but now...she just wanted to sleep.

Sesshomaru said nothing. Instead he pulled her closer, and for a brief moment she allowed herself to nuzzle into that soft fur wrapped over his shoulder, knowing even as she did that it would only be harder when he broke away but _wanting_ it all the same...

"We will fly."

She started, casting a questioning glance in his direction. He watched her steadily, asking her to trust him without speaking so much as a word...

Kagura nodded, and that long trail of fur wrapped around her even as she held on tight. This form of flight was still strange to her, after using the wind for so long; idly she let her fan fall open, pulling the breeze up at his heels to carry them higher until the gentle sway of their progress finally lulled her into an easy doze.

When she woke, the countryside below them had changed completely. She could see no trace of the mountains or the rocky foothills they'd traversed: now there were only green fields dotted with villages, stretches of woodland broken up by winding roads and the occasional shrine. It seemed odd, that they were straying so close to humans again -- at least until they descended, landing in front of a somewhat familiar hut where a _very_ familiar girl eagerly waved a greeting.

"Lord Sesshomaru!" Rin cried. "You're back! It's so good to see you again! Master Jaken," she giggled, bowing to the imp. And when Kagura moved to stand beside the demons, the girl's face lit up. "Oh, Kagura! I'm so happy to see you, too!"

"Really?" she asked. 

"Of course," Rin beamed. "I was hoping you'd come back. Have you been well?"

"No," Sesshomaru said before Kagura could speak. She shot him a pointed look, drawing in a breath to argue--

"Oh, no!" Suddenly the child was holding her hand and pulling her toward the building, despite her attempts to protest. "Don't worry, Lady Kaede will know what to do," she insisted.

And at that point, she supposed she didn't have much of a choice. She submitted awkwardly to being poked and prodded, paying more attention to Rin's cheerful (if one-sided) conversation than to the old woman looking her over. "I've just been tired," she shrugged when the girl stopped to question her. "The travel hasn't exactly been kind, these past few months."

"I would expect not," Kaede piped up, her hands resting firmly on Kagura's waist just above her hips. "And I imagine it will only get harder as the pregnancy proceeds."

Rin gasped at the same moment that Kagura turned to stare at the old woman. _"Pregnancy?"_ they repeated in unison.

"Why, yes," Kaede replied, seeming surprised by the response. "I would guess it's still rather early, but..."

"You're going to be a mother!?" Rin asked excitedly, suddenly so close to Kagura's side that she shuffled instinctively away while the child leaned eagerly toward her. "Who's the father -- is it Lord Sesshomaru?" she gasped. "Does that mean I'm going to be a big sister!?"

She didn't have an opportunity to actually _answer_ any of the questions flung at her. Before she could even try, Rin had vanished, the reed mat over the doorway swaying from her swift departure.

"My, but she is a quick one," the old woman chuckled.

"Are all children like that?" Kagura asked.

"Oh, no, not at all," Kaede replied, creaking to her feet. "No two are quite alike. Even twins like Sango's will be different from each other, no matter how alike they may seem. And neither will be like young Rin."

"...huh." Standing again, she re-adjusted her kimono, turning awkwardly toward the old priestess. "...thank you," she added, slipping back out into the afternoon sunlight.

She could hear Rin chattering away, and when she turned to follow the sound she saw Sesshomaru look up at her. "I hope I haven't delayed us too long," she sighed. "We can go whenever you're ready--"

"We stay."

Kagura paused as he moved to stand before her. "There's no need to stop on my account," she protested. "I'll be fine." For a while, at least...

He shook his head very slightly, as clear a refusal as if he'd spoken aloud. Sighing to herself, she drew the fan from her sleeve, idly letting it fall open and shutter closed with the slightest shift of her wrist. "Don't let me keep you, then. You have important business to tend, after all--"

His hand settled on her wrist, the tips of his claws barely pricking at her skin. "We stay," he repeated _._

And that touch promised they would stay together.

\-----

It was for the best that they settled in the village. Kagura would not have made it far, had they left.

The fatigue ran far deeper than she cared to admit, and had only grown worse by summer's end; the furthest she went now was the edge of the forest with Rin for a guide, gathering herbs for the old priestess or foraging for roots and mushrooms before winter set in. It was familiar, now, and easy from long practice, though it felt far more pleasant having the child's company than it ever had alone (or with Jaken's grudging assistance). Some days they even ventured down to the river to fish -- and Rin's awe when Kagura sliced one effortlessly from the water to the shore never failed to make her smile.

Harder still to accept was that her body had begun to fail her, in ways she was sure had nothing at all to do with lives now growing within her -- two, according to Sesshomaru, whose keen ears had picked up the flutters of twin heartbeats in recent days. The wind seemed to call her, slightly more insistent with each passing day, and something deep within her now strained to answer. She quelled the feeling each time...

But while she was determined to resist it as long as possible, she was increasingly unsure of how much longer she would be _able_ to.

"Kagura?"

She stirred at the call, glancing up at Rin as the child crept closer. The first snow had begun to fall late that morning, and though it was still too warm to gather on the ground she had become rather lost in watching the flakes drift and swirl in the breeze. "What is it?" she asked, debating whether to rise from her comfortable rest beneath the tree or not.

Smiling shyly, the girl scampered over to her side and took a seat, looking out at the falling snow much like Kagura herself had. She turned back to watch, herself, vaguely amused by the imitation...and all the more by Rin's rather obvious glances and the way she inched closer after the woman looked away. "What is it?" Kagura asked again, wondering just when she had become so fond of the child beside her.

"Ummm...I was wondering," Rin mumbled, fidgeting with her hands in her lap.

Kagura waited for her to continue. But there was only silence, even their breath muffled by the gentle flurries of snow. "What were you wondering?" she asked.

Rin glanced at her, then away again. "Have you...thought of any names yet? For the babies?"

"I hadn't thought about it," Kagura admitted, settling one hand on the growing swell of her stomach. "Did you have an idea?"

The girl shook her head, continuing to toy with her fingers. "I was just curious."

Smiling to herself, she propped her head in her hand. "If you do think of something, would you tell me? We could use the help."

Rin beamed up at her, nodding enthusiastically as she scooted another inch closer. She did not speak again...but Kagura got the sense that there was a great deal more on the girl's mind. "Was there something else?" she asked.

The child said nothing for another moment, her breath billowing out into a misty cloud in the chill air. "I...I lost my parents. And my brothers. A long time ago." Her voice grew quiet as she spoke, shifting to pull her knees up toward her chest and hug them tight. "I was alone for a long time. But...then Lord Sesshomaru came, and saved me from the wolves, and...I was so happy, because I wasn't alone anymore, and he was so kind to me, and..."

She peeked over at Kagura again, then back to her knees. "I'm really glad you came back," she mumbled. "Lord Sesshomaru was so upset, when you died. He broke his sword, you know. That's how he lost it. So I was really happy when you came back with him, and now you're going to have a family, a-and...and I was wondering...since I'm going to be their big sister, right?" She looked up again as Kagura nodded in agreement, breathing a little sigh of relief. "W-well, Lord Sesshomaru is...like a father to me. And. Uhm. I was wondering...if..."

Her voice dwindled to nothing. Glancing at the child again, Kagura saw her staring at the weave of her kimono rather than looking at the woman beside her...so she shifted slightly, giving Rin her full attention. "You were wondering?" she repeated

The girl looked up, shrinking a bit tighter into her huddle. "Would you be my mother?" she asked.

Kagura had not been sure where this conversation was going from the outset. But somehow, that question still managed to stun her. This child she had once abducted, who had no reason to care for her at all, who would have _every right_ to avoid her or even wish her ill...this child who had once saved her life, who had greeted her with an embrace upon her return to life, who had welcomed her again with open arms...now wanted her to be a part of the family she had found.

She had no name for the swell of emotion that caught in her throat. But even if she had the words to answer, she doubted she could voice them. She reached out, instead, hesitantly smoothing the girl's hair -- and as if some dam had broken wide with that touch, Rin flung herself into Kagura's arms and clung fast. "Thank you," she sniffed.

Kagura could only nod, returning the embrace in somewhat awkward kind and letting the child pretend that the damp spot spreading on the woman's kimono was simply from stray snowflakes, just as her shaking was nothing more than a product of the cold. 

She could not say how long they remained like that. But in time enough, Rin slid down to rest her head in Kagura's lap, falling into a quiet doze while the woman stroked her hair. The child shivered when the breeze picked up and sent the snowflakes tumbling, and Kagura withdrew her fan and stilled the wind without a word, looking out over the quiet village as the light began to fade from the cloudy sky...

Warmth enveloped her, soft and by now familiar. Looking down, she saw the trailing fur settled over Rin, as well...and when she looked up, she saw Sesshomaru standing beside her. "Welcome back," she murmured. Not that he had strayed far in the past few months; at worst he disappeared for a day, gone shortly before noon and returned by sunrise.

"Is everything alright?"

"I think so," she agreed, gently working through a slight snarl in the child's hair. "Rin is looking forward to being a sister. She asked about names for them." 

A quiet sound, nearly inaudible in the muffling snowfall. The breeze picked up again, and part of her strained to join it, so desperately that she held her breath for fear that something in her would escape if she let it go...

The air stilled, and she blew out a shaky sigh, tightening her hand on the fan by her side. Her second chance at life in a borrowed human form already seemed to be growing short; how much longer would this body last? 

"What is it?"

She glanced up at him again, fighting for even a wan smile. She couldn't even guess how long Sesshomaru had lived, or how much longer his life would last. Thousands of years, perhaps -- far beyond any human's life, even when they did not fail so soon. And the lives still growing within her...

"They'll be half-demons," she murmured. "Not one and not the other." She'd witnessed the lingering enmity between Sesshomaru and his half-brother on more than one occasion since settling down here, temporary though that was; even now she couldn't be sure how much of that bad blood was from their shared heritage and how much was from InuYasha's mixed lineage. The great demon had softened his stance toward humans, at least in part, but...

Touching her stomach, she felt the slightest movement beneath her palm. "Knowing that," she continued quietly, "what will they be to you?"

He knelt beside her, settling his hand atop hers. "They are yours," he replied simply. "They are _ours._ That is all that matters."

She chuckled softly, turning her head toward him and feeling him touch his brow to hers. "You're right," she agreed. 

Humans, demons, something in-between...it didn't matter, in the end: no matter their blood, they would be family. 

\-----

Maybe it was fate that kept Kagura going, living day by day on borrowed time. Maybe it was simply chance. Some part of her thought it might be sheer stubborn will. She and Sesshomaru really were a well-matched pair, in that regard.

But she knew she could not hold forever. As the snow melted and the first blush of spring buds brought color back to the grey landscape, she found it harder and harder to resist the call of the passing wind; there were days when the sound was so enchanting that everything else seemed to fall away, and only a touch could pull her awareness back to her living, breathing body.

It was pain that grounded her today.

She had been told what to expect, by the old priestess who would serve as midwife and the demon slayer who had herself become mother to twins. Rin stayed by her most days, ready to fetch Kaede at the first sign of labor, such that when it finally came -- a faint twinge, a rush of pale fluid, nothing more -- she barely had a chance to speak before the child vanished. Kagura breathed a slow sigh in the still air...and carefully unbound her hair, removed her earrings, and returned the ornaments to their box (one of the few frivolous, beautiful things she had cared to keep through the long journey) before giving both it and her fan to Sesshomaru.

"For safekeeping," she'd said.

She wondered if he knew it was a lie.

The hours whiled by, at the outset. There was some discomfort, but Kagura had no difficulty walking about within the little hut, listening to Rin chattering on (sometimes to her, sometimes to the babies soon to arrive), joining in the conversation herself now and then. But it deepened, gradually, shifting from frequent twinges to pressure so intense she could not speak. 

And then came the pain, close on its heels.

She was not alone. She could hear the old priestess nearby, giving instructions Kagura seemed to parse by instinct alone; she could feel Rin's hands holding her own, squeezing tight in a silent signal to push...but louder and stronger than either of them was the wind that filled the little building, howling with every contraction and fading to a whispered caress between. 

Kagura had wondered, at first, why it did not bother the others. But she realized, through the haze of pain, that they could not feel it. Could not hear it. The storm was trapped inside this human body: only she knew how it raged and strained within the confines of flesh and muscle and bone.

_Not yet,_ she willed, gritting her teeth against the next wave of pain and feeling the gale rise within her. 

She could not say when the numbness set in. One minute she still felt the agony wracking her borrowed form, and the next...there was only a strange sort of pressure, dull and somehow disconnected from her senses. She thought she heard a tiny, trembling cry rise from somewhere in the room -- but it might have been the wind that seeped from her with every gasping breath. There were voices, too, encouraging but far away, muted beneath the storm at her core. Her strength was fading, _failing,_ but she could still feel fingers holding tight to her own, the silent signal to continue.

_Just a bit more,_ she begged, pouring every ounce of will she still had into one more push.

She did not feel it. Her body had responded, she felt somehow certain of that -- but even the numbness had faded, replaced by a hollow absence of sensation. Faintly she could hear Rin's voice, earnest and excited though she could make out no words. Only the impression that it was done. It was over.

She let go, and the wind whispered out of the human shell in a deep, exhausted sigh.

The air within the hut stirred, though neither the child nor the priestess seemed to notice. Rin's hair fluttered as she tried in vain to rouse the woman whose heartbeat had slowed to nothing. The two mewling babes swaddled in their robes quieted when the breeze caressed their cheeks. The reed mat over the entryway rustled with the passage of something unseen...and when Sesshomaru turned to look toward that trace of movement, the wind kissed the moon upon his brow, ruffling the fur wound over his shoulder as it moved further into the dark.

_I am the wind._

For the first time, Kagura mourned that fact.

***

Sesshomaru had little understanding of human rituals, and little interest in changing that. Though he had grown increasingly tolerant of mankind in recent years, they were still strange and inscrutable creatures at best, with unfathomable beliefs and arbitrary rules governed by no apparent logic nor purpose. It was far simpler to accept and continue on.

Their birthing rites were no different. Men were barred from taking part, which suited him well enough: he loathed the confines of their dwellings, and made every effort to avoid them. As ever, he remained nearby, listening to the voices and the movements beyond his sight while standing watch, alert for any trace of danger and ever ready to bare his fangs and claws should the need arise.

It did not, this day.

Sunlight faded to darkness, and the moon rose over the silent landscape. Even the wind had gone quiet, the budding trees standing perfectly still beneath a cloudless sky. It would be done soon, he imagined: already he had heard one small, unfamiliar cry from within the building beneath his feet, followed shortly after by a second, both fading swiftly to whines and then to silence...

Something rustled below.

He turned his gaze toward the ground, expecting to see Rin, hear her voice calling him down...but the child was not there. The space before the hut remained empty, and his eyes briefly narrowed as he tuned his every sense toward his surroundings, seeking any unfamiliar presence in the night--

A warm breeze brushed through his bangs, trailing away through his fur.

...yet the forest remained utterly still.

Leaping down from the roof, he pushed his way into the building, knowing what he would find even before he could see it with his own eyes: the old woman and Rin struggling and failing to rouse a woman who had already died, whose life he had restored once before with Tenseiga, and who he could not revive a second time. Not that it would matter, even if he could: the wind had already left that body.

"L-Lord Sesshomaru," Rin stammered, staring at him with wide, frightened eyes. "I'm sorry -- It's Kagura, s-she's not...a-and we can't..."

"The children."

The girl jumped, scrambling over to a bundle of blankets nearby. "They're fine -- baby girls, both of them, and healthy, b-but..."

As she lifted them, he caught his first glimpse of the infants: one with hair as pale as his own, save for a single tuft of red slightly off from the center of her brow; the other with locks as dark as her mother's, matching scarlet spots near her temples. But even without such obvious marks, he would have known by scent alone whose blood they carried.

"Give them to me."

She obeyed, passing the children one by one into his arms, and he in turn cradled both against the fur coiled over his shoulder, hearing their whimpers fade within its warmth. He turned without a word, lifting the woven reeds--

The old priestess called after him. "Wait!"

"W-what about Kagura?" Rin asked in a high, trembling voice.

"That is not Kagura." Looking back, he saw the girl's confusion, watched her look between him and the body growing colder with each passing moment. "I have no attachment to an empty shell."

Moving out into the night, he reached beneath his cuirass, his claws skimming over the fan she had entrusted to his care, the lacquered box...and finally took hold of a single white plume: a gift the wind had carried to him, long before she had even a borrowed form -- long before he knew her as anything but a memory of loss and longing. He held it in his open hand, an offering to the night and the air that held as still as bated breath...

"Kagura."

The wind flowed past, lifting the feather from his palm. For a moment he watched it dance, wheeling and spinning higher as it twirled around him, never once touching the ground...before finally coming to rest in his hand once more.

Rin gasped, holding her hands up and laughing as the breeze played through her hair. "We will return," Sesshomaru said, raising the feather high over his head -- and when the wind swept it from his fingers, he followed, flying high in pursuit of that moonlit beacon as it crossed the night sky, both infants tucked safe against him.

The gale lifted him higher, carrying them west toward the mountains where human settlements grew sparse, replaced by single dwellings at the forest's edge or hidden within the dense woods. The acrid stench of smoke reached him long before the feather led him down toward the flame-shrouded buildings far below, the roiling heat nearly buffeting it from its course. Still it continued, skirting around the burning hut and drifting into the shadows of the trees, dancing from one dappled patch of moonlight to the next; landing smoothly in the smouldering grass, he followed the plume on foot until the smell of smoke at last faded, replaced instead by that of fresh blood.

He did not need the wind to lead him any further. Moving smoothly forward, he let his nose and ears guide him toward the sounds of voices and violence until at last he arrived at the site of a massacre. Armed and armored men -- bandits, if he cared to pass judgment -- had slaughtered the inhabitants of the destroyed hut by the forest's edge, and now pillaged what few possessions the hapless men and women had escaped with. The closest of the rogues looked up at the demon's approach, reaching for his blade -- and Sesshomaru cut him down with a wave of his hand.

Some of the wretches were wise enough to retreat when he strode through their midst, approaching the feather that now hovered over a woman's body...which stirred, in another moment, sending the rest of the men recoiling as the corpse rose awkwardly from the blood-soaked earth.

"What in hell!?"

"She were dead when I checked, I swear she were!"

"What manner of evil spirit is it!?"

Sesshomaru did not bother to look at them when he spoke. "Leave, if you value your lives."

Those who had any sense at all fled in fear through the dark. Those without merely became part of the carnage they themselves had sown before his arrival. 

In the silence that followed, the woman's body lurched upright, struggling awkwardly to find its feet. "Ugh. It's been a long time since I've done this," she mumbled, holding out her hand while the feather floated gently into her palm. "I'll admit, though, I'm surprised you kept this."

He took the plume from her upraised hand, tucking it wordlessly back into his cuirass before drawing Tenseiga with his off hand. "Will this body serve?" he asked.

"It suits me well enough," she agreed. 

The sword pulsed, revealing the ghostly shapes of the netherworld's minions -- and with two swift slashes he dispatched them, watching them crumble like so much ash as the body slumped to its knees.

The wind quieted and fell still.

A moment passed. 

The woman's heart beat.

She raised her head and smiled up at him, lifting her arms as he sheathed his blade and knelt before her. He had not been sure whether Tenseiga could be used to revive a new body for the same soul -- but when he offered her the items she had entrusted to him, she accepted them all without hesitation, donning the earrings and securing her hair in the high twist she had always favored before opening the fan with the ease of long practice. "Thank you," Kagura murmured, turning her gaze to the infants bundled against his fur. "Are they...?"

By way of answer, he offered them to her, and she took them gently into her arms. The children stirred and whimpered for a moment -- but she called forth a breeze with the slightest shift of her hand, its song calming them in no more than a moment. "Did we ever decide on names?" she asked, her gaze never leaving the newborns cradled against her breast.

They had discussed it from time to time, though they had never come to any decisions. But now he reached out, stroking the lone red mark in their daughter's fair hair. "Towa."

Now she did turn a startled glance toward him. He met it steadily, watching the smile that spread across her new face before she looked to the infants once more, the tips of her fingers stroking one of the scarlet spots among the other child's dark locks. "Setsuna," she offered, her eyes meeting his once more.

Something in his expression softened at that suggestion. Touching the infant's hair, he nodded, taking once more to his feet and offering his hand down to her; cradling both children with one arm, she accepted, rising with his aid...and moving easily into his embrace.

"We will fly," he said quietly. She nodded into his fur -- yet neither one of them moved, the silent moment stretching into the still night...

A whimpering cry rose from somewhere between them. At last they stirred, Kagura's quiet laughter drifting behind him as his fur coiled around her -- and when he took to the skies, the wind once more swirled beneath him, carrying them ever further west


	4. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kagura's new life begins with Sesshomaru and their twin daughters. They are happy, they are safe, and they are _free_ \-- there's little more that she could ask for. But tragedy looms on the horizon as her body once more begins to fail...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yashahime has denied me all parental interactions and I consider this a crime, so I'm compensating. More bonus points if you can guess what the demons in this chapter are. ;) 
> 
> Once again, dashes (-) indicate a change of scene and asterisks (*) indicate a change of perspective; the final slashes (/) are an epilogue. Thanks so much for reading, and I hope you enjoy the end!

Kagura's new body had lived a very different life than her previous one had. The last time she'd done this, she had spent months getting her borrowed form in any condition for travel; this time, her body was already strong from years of weaving and washing and working fields and farmland. She would have had no trouble at all keeping up with the journey from the outset in this form...but this time, there was none for her to undertake.

Funny, how fate had twisted these threads.

As she discovered, Sesshomaru had kept the gifts she'd turned down not so long ago. They stopped not far from a modest settlement in the mountains, and while she washed away the blood from mended skin he vanished into the night once more, returning soon enough with kimonos she recognized from their strange and subtle courtship. This time, though, she accepted, donning them without complaint and gathering up the two fussing infants before setting out toward the village with the great demon following in the trees, just out of sight.

She attracted more than a few wondering looks when she arrived. As she told the men and women who approached, she had only come seeking a wetnurse for her twin daughters -- but the villagers mistook her for a lady of some rank, thanks to her handsome attire, and even before a pair of women volunteered their aid (both new mothers, themselves, as she eventually gathered) others suggested she take up residence in the stately manor house left vacant by the disgraced noble who had recently abandoned the region...and, given that the twins would need such care for some time yet, she agreed.

Sesshomaru refused to enter the building itself, which hardly surprised her anymore; however, the garden at the manor's heart stood open to the sky, and he took no issue with spending his time there. She joined him with their daughters every evening, and without fail both infants fell soundly asleep bundled warm within his fur. He was, as ever, not given to idle talk -- but the silent care he took with their children spoke loud enough of his feelings for them.

Some part of her knew that peace would be short-lived. But that seemed almost commonplace in the life she'd known.

"Where is your husband, Lady Kagura?" Mizuki asked one afternoon as she bundled Setsuna back into her mother's arms.

"Away, for now," Kagura replied easily. It was not a lie, after all; Sesshomaru often departed with Jaken in the early hours just before sunrise, returning with the fall of night to avoid the humans that so frequently roamed the manor's halls by day.

"Aren't you worried?" Hanako asked, rocking Towa slightly while the child nursed. "It's been almost four months since you came alone, without even an escort, and he still hasn't returned..."

"He has grand designs," she chuckled. "He aims to become the Lord of the West; that's not achieved in a day." Nor a year, nor possibly even a decade -- but he had time. And with Tenseiga's aid, it seemed likely that she would, as well.

"He must be very strong," Hanako mused.

"Do you think he and his army could fight a demon?" Mizuki asked.

Kagura stilled, cradling Setsuna close. "A demon?"

Both women nodded. Holding Towa against her shoulder, Hanako patted the child's back gently, keeping her voice easy despite how troubled she seemed. "The men have heard one in the woods lately. Terrible howls -- and it almost tore off a woodcutter's arm this morning, way I hear."

"It's been getting closer and closer to the village the past few days," Mizuki added. "Everyone's worried it's going to attack -- we can't fight off something like that on our own, but if your lord husband could see to it..."

Kagura smiled slightly, gathering Towa up when Hanako offered her back and feeling the infant's small hands grasp at her kimono. "I'll get a message to him and see what can be done."

Sesshomaru's answer, when she raised it with him on his return, was exactly the one she'd expected: "It is not my concern."

"Isn't it," Kagura remarked, flicking her fan open and closed before an enraptured Setsuna. The demon glanced toward her, a silent question in his eyes. "Towa and Setsuna aren't weaned yet. And _I_ certainly can't nurse them any better now than I could before. Oh, I don't doubt that we could wander off somewhere else, find a new nurse or two -- we certainly have that power -- but in doing so, you cede territory to another demon."

His eyes narrowed. "Human villages are not part of my dominion."

"Why not? They're part of the western lands, aren't they? Just like the demon dens are. How could you ever claim to be Lord of the West if you leave out whatever pieces humans have settled on?"

He had no ready answer for that.

"You don't have to like them, or even take an interest in them. It's not like I have," she shrugged. "But the fact is that if you would claim this as your territory, then you have to deal with the demon that's making a mess of it. ...there's these two to think of, too, you know," she added, waving her fan toward the infants nestled in their father's fur. "We don't know what this thing is. If it's weak enough, I could handle it on my own -- but if it's not, I can't fly us to safety. Are you willing to risk _them,_ just to avoid sullying your claws on behalf of humans?"

Sesshomaru's claws drifted over the red marks in their daughters' hair. "Jaken."

The imp jumped to attention at his master's call. "Yes, Milord?"

"Watch them. We're going."

Both infants began to fuss when their father moved away, taking their warm nest with him. Kagura rose smoothly from her own place, joining him without a word and taking hold of his trailing fur even as it wrapped around her, carrying them both up over the manor and toward the forest beyond the humans' houses and fields. Landing silently at the edge of the trees, he let his hand fall on the hilt of Bakusaiga -- a surprisingly threatening gesture for so early in the confrontation -- and she moved to follow in his wake rather than walking by his side as they moved into the dense woods.

They heard the creature long before they saw it, and Sesshomaru had clearly _sensed_ it well before that. The howls were not what she expected, though: to her, it sounded more like the wind than any beast...and as if to confirm her suspicions, the branches whipped and cracked as a sudden whirlwind gale swept toward them.

Kagura's fan snapped open, and with one flick of her wrist the winds died to nothing, sending three dark shapes sprawling into the muddy leaves. They slithered to their feet in another moment, and beneath the faint moonlight their pointed faces grinned wide enough to bare their fangs, sickle claws twitching eagerly while they bobbed and wove back into tight formation.

"Well well! I thought I smelled a dog of late," one snickered. "Looks like I was right."

"Haven't seen one of them for an age," a second remarked in a high, reedy voice. "Longer since we had a taste of one."

"Now, now," the last said, raising a clawed limb. "This one has an offering for us. Let's hear him out."

"Who're you calling an _offering?"_ Kagura scoffed, shuttering her fan with a snap. "I could slice you weasel-faced rats to ribbons."

"Mmn, a _feisty_ offering," the second cackled. "She'll be great fun to toy with--"

Sesshomaru was in their midst before she could blink. The three demons squealed and leapt away from him -- though not fast enough for one of them, whose arm remained behind at her husband’s feet. Even as they hissed in rage, he raised his sword in warning. "Leave this place if you value your lives."

"Who are you to give us orders!?" they howled in unison, racing in circles around the dog demon and pulling the wind with them. "We'll tear you apart!!"

Opening her fan again, Kagura turned once in place, her instrument dragging the wind away from their mad rush and leaving all three completely exposed -- and in the next instant Bakusaiga flashed, the silver metal crackling with green light as it cleaved one of the three in half.

"This territory is mine," Sesshomaru said, his voice as cold and sharp as the blade in his hand. "Hunt here again and I will do the same to you."

The weasels hissed and flashed their scythe-like claws...but after another moment, they backed down, their sinuous bodies bowing before they scuttled into the trees out of sight.

"That went well," Kagura remarked, sauntering to his side.

He made a vague noise, sheathing his sword once more. "You could have handled them alone."

"Well, I know that _now,_ " Kagura shrugged. "But there's something to be said about staking your claim. Don't you think?"

Sesshomaru did not argue. He merely turned back the way they'd come, and together they returned to the forest's edge, then to the skies, and finally to the children that impatiently awaited them.

\-----

After finding the remains of the weasel demon, the villagers began treating Kagura like the wife of a deity.

She had said nothing about the incident, of course, and even when asked only confirmed that she had relayed the message to her husband. But they convinced themselves that she had interceded on their behalf with some divine presence, and nothing she did could change their minds. Frankly she found the offerings they left to be excessive, especially since Sesshomaru had no interest in human food...but it seemed to give them some peace of mind, so she did not deter them from leaving their gifts at the modest shrine near the gates of the estate.

She couldn't fault them for their belief, though: after all, what was a deity besides a demon that had chosen to safeguard its territory without preying on its inhabitants?

Towa and Setsuna grew swiftly, and soon enough Jaken struggled to keep up with their escapades. Kagura herself found it difficult in human company, when she couldn't use her fan to whisk them back -- something both girls seemed to delight in, judging by their shrieks of laughter when the wind bounced them up and back to her side, not to mention how eagerly they crawled back to where the gale had scooped them up -- but Sesshomaru never seemed to struggle in keeping up with them, plucking them up whenever they wandered too far from view.

In little enough time they both were weaned, and with their reliance on humans severed, the great demon once more prepared for travel. And that, in turn, led to arguing -- not about the destination, but about the place they were leaving behind. Sesshomaru had every intention of never looking back once they departed; Kagura believed it wiser to maintain some connection, in the event that they needed a safe place to recover from an injury...or, loath as she was to consider the possibility, another period of acclimation. The first months in both these borrowed bodies were her most vulnerable: while the wind settled into a form that was not meant for it, her reactions were slower and her control of the gale far weaker than usual. If she did have need of another body, having a safe haven could be to her advantage...and their children's, as well, since she would be hard-pressed to protect them herself during those first months.

It almost surprised her, how that argument swayed him. 

The day after, she informed the most frequent visitors of her plans to join her husband on his quest, asking that they keep the manor in order for their return; and that night they departed, soaring east through the moonlit dark while their daughters dozed in the warmth of their father's fur and their mother's arms.

By sunrise they'd crossed the mountains and returned to familiar territory. Kagura recognized the countryside this time, long before they descended toward the huts and fields beyond the forest -- but both Towa and Setsuna stared in wonder at the world below that grew larger the closer they drew to the village. When they landed, Kagura moved smoothly away, plucking Towa easily from where she clung to Sesshomaru's fur and placing her on the ground; Setsuna, meanwhile, refused to let go, burrowing down deeper rather than releasing her grip...

"Lord Sesshomaru!!"

Kagura relented, turning her attention instead to the girl running up the path to greet them. Towa, too, had seen her -- and shied behind her mother, peeking out at the stranger even as her sister peered up over their father's shoulder, both watching as Rin skipped to a stop before the great demon and tucked her basket securely against her hip. "I'm so happy to see you! Will you be staying long this time?"

Her voice sounded hopeful -- and all the more when she happened to spy the little face peeping out of his fur. "Hello," she giggled, lifting her free hand in a tiny wave that Setsuna, after a moment's pause, returned. Looking around, she spied Towa -- or, more accurately, the girl's tiny fingers clinging to her mother's kimono...

When Rin looked up, Kagura smiled. "It's been a while," she murmured. "Sorry about leaving like that. I hope I didn't worry you too much."

The girl's face lit up with wonder, the basket nearly slipping from her grasp. "...Kagura...?"

By way of answer, she withdrew the fan from her sleeve, opening it with a flick of her wrist that sent the breeze ruffling through their hair. "Did you miss me?" she teased--

The basket fell forgotten as Rin flung herself at the woman, sending Towa scampering behind her father before anyone could trip over her. "You're back," the girl sniffled, burying her face into Kagura's kimono. "You're back -- I was so worried, after what happened, when you didn't return with Lord Sesshomaru..."

"I'd have been back sooner, but these little ones couldn't go too far for a while, and someone needed to stay with them and keep them safe while he wandered off." The demon shot her a particularly telling look, which she met with a coy grin before tucking her fan away and kneeling to gather Towa up in her arms. "Rin, meet your sisters: Towa and Setsuna."

When the girl reached out to the silver-haired child, Towa clung shyly to her mother, instead; Setsuna, though, stretched her own hand out in greeting, grabbing for Rin with chubby fingers. "It’s so good to see you again! I’m your big sister,” she introduced herself, beaming at the child in Kagura’s arms, “and I’m your _big_ big sister,” she giggled, letting the dark-hared child grasp her fingers. "I’m so happy to meet you -- and I'm sure Moroha will be, too!"

"Moroha?" Kagura repeated.

"InuYasha and Kagome's daughter," Rin explained. "She was born after you left -- I know they'll be so excited to see you again, we should go meet them!"

She somehow doubted that InuYasha would be terribly thrilled to see his brother (and the demon’s flat expression said the feeling would be entirely mutual). But she still followed with Towa cradled against her...and whatever his misgivings, she still heard Seshomaru keeping pace a mere half step behind them.

\-----

They stayed a while in the village, much to InuYasha's apparent consternation. If nothing else, the two brothers made an attempt to tolerate one another for the sake of the children, who managed to get along far better than their fathers ever had. Kagura had an easier time keeping up with three little troublemakers than Kagome did (though she also had more experience, given that two of them were hers), and most days were spent in the fields and forest chasing the girls as they tussled and tumbled to and fro, often enough with Rin stealing time to join in the fun.

It was good for them. The children were still new to travel, so short journeys with time between gave them a chance to see the world that had opened up before their eyes. So while Kagura yearned to wander again, she reined in that feeling, knowing that the journey would continue soon enough -- and equally comfortable in the knowledge that Sesshomaru would not leave her behind when that time came.

When they did depart, they went on foot, exploring the woods and the wilds beyond mankind's presence; everything was new to Towa and Setsuna, and they daily wore Jaken to exhaustion in their eagerness to explore. From her own wealth of experience, Kagura taught them about foraging for roots and mushrooms, how to tell edible plants from poisonous ones, how to predict the weather by reading the wind and sky. Young as they were, she hardly expected them to remember it all: everything seemed like magic to them, and she saw no reason to correct them, using their fascination to impart all the lessons she could. 

Demons were a rare sight, though the few they stumbled across -- the few that dared challenge Sesshomaru -- were swiftly dispatched. Jaken needed no instruction to see the twins to safety each time, allowing them out only when his master called for him. Perhaps that was simply a product of his time with Rin, though Kagura suspected he had a soft spot for the girls, as well: for all his grumbling, the imp was quite reliable when it came to ensuring their safety while their parents were preoccupied. 

Their progress was slower than it had ever been. But their children were safe, and they were _free._ She could ask for nothing more than that.

Eventually a chill returned to the air, and with it the leaves began to turn from green to red and gold. The twins, ever distractible, spent much of the morning chasing the last butterflies through a field of grass nearly tall enough to obscure them both from sight but for the way it rustled and swayed from their passage. Sesshomaru seemed...preoccupied, keeping his eyes trained on the sky and its scattered clouds while she and Jaken kept an eye on the children. Something about it made her uneasy, in a way she could not quite define, and part of her attention remained on her husband even while she watched the girls scampering after the late autumn insects before they fled the coming frost.

He tensed, a minute gesture visible only in the way his fingers curled and shoulders stiffened -- but in an instant her fan was in her hand, her eyes scanning the sky above for any trace of danger...

There was a shadow behind the clouds. A distinctly canine one.

She glanced at him in surprise, her instrument still half shuttered. She had never seen another dog demon -- not a full one, at least. His father was dead, by his own admission; was this one he knew? Or some enemy that put their half-demon children at risk...

The rustling in the grass ceased for a moment. When it resumed, both trails led straight back to her side, and she felt the tiny hands grip her kimono tight as the twins took shelter behind her. Sesshomaru had yet to call for Jaken, but still she waited, ready to act in a heartbeat while she watched the unfamiliar demon emerge from the cover of the clouds, bounding toward the ground...and shrinking with every step, until the great dog shape was entirely gone, replaced instead by a stately woman with silver-white hair tied back into twin tails.

Kagura did not need to ask if he knew the woman anymore: the moon on her brow and the thin streaks of color beneath her yellow eyes seemed far too reminiscent of Sesshomaru's own markings to be mere coincidence.

"Ah, Sesshomaru," the woman smiled. "I thought that was your scent I caught on the wind. Were you going to pass by without visiting your poor, lonely mother?"

Well, that certainly explained the resemblance.

"Mother." 

The greeting almost sounded like an insult, as cold and clipped as it was. The woman paid it no mind, though, turning her attention instead to Kagura. Her gaze was predatory, in a way that even Sesshomaru's was not -- but she sensed no malice, either. Not yet, at least. "This is not the same human you were traveling with when you visited me last, is it? The one you braved the Netherworld for?"

"Rin is safe elsewhere," he replied curtly.

Before he could say more (if he even intended to), his mother's attention honed in on the twins now peeking out from behind Kagura. "...my, but you did inherit some of your father's stranger tastes," she sighed. "These are yours -- by this human?"

"I'm not sure if 'human' is the right word for whatever I am," Kagura shrugged, a wave of her fan turning the breeze rippling through the grass around them back upon itself. "I am the wind -- though it's true that this body is a human one."

"The wind, you say," the woman repeated, resting one clawed hand contemplatively on her cheek. "A demon of some sort, in a human shell? How curious. Does the wind have a name?"

She felt a smile curve across her lips as she dipped into a polite bow. "I go by Kagura."

"And those children are yours by my son?"

"They are," she agreed.

In an instant the woman's demeanor changed, her intensity unraveling into something almost unnervingly warm. "I hope you do not think me rude, not greeting you sooner -- my son never bothered to mention that he had taken a wife, let alone had children!"

He'd never mentioned his mother to Kagura at all, which implied quite a lot about his feelings for the woman now standing before them.

"Are you finished, Mother?" Sesshomaru asked.

"Of course not," she replied breezily, adjusting her fur-trimmed robe. "You _must_ come stay with me for a while, that I might become acquainted with you. We are family, after all: these children share my blood through yours." She looked back at her son for just a moment, an unmistakable sort of triumph in her bearing.

His voice was just short of a growl when he spoke again. "Do you insist?"

"I do."

He didn't argue further. But he did move to stand between his mother and his children, his trailing ruff coiling protectively around both the girls and Kagura, alike. "Would you mind telling me what we're in for?" she murmured, gathering Towa and Setsuna up while Sesshomaru's mother transformed back into her true shape, ready to guide them back to wherever she had flown from.

"If I knew, I would," he replied. Which sounded ominous, despite how welcoming his mother had been. "...but I will tell you what I can later," he promised, wrapping them safely in his fur before taking off toward the clouds in his mother's wake.

That was all she could ask for.

\-----

For all of Sesshomaru's concern, his mother had no obvious ill will toward either Kagura or their half-demon children. Not that she could blame him for worrying: between what he told her his last visit that sent him through the Netherworld and what she could see with her own eyes in their interactions, there was littlelove lost between mother and son. At the very least, the grand demon was nothing but pleasant with Kagura and the twins, and she took full advantage of that fact, occupying as much of the woman's attention as she could to allow Sesshomaru a chance to depart unimpeded.

Towa and Setsuna took swiftly to their grandmother, and through the winter they spent in her floating palace both children quickly won the grand demon's favor. Ever free spirits, they explored the endless halls and rooms of the palace with Jaken in pursuit, but at even an echo of the woman's voice they would scamper from wherever they'd disappeared to, eager for a gift, a treat, a story -- whatever their grandmother happened to have.

For her own part, Kagura got along marvellously with the woman. They were both quick-witted and cunning, and she sensed that every conversation revealed something new about each of them to the other...yet she found she didn't mind when it allowed her to engage with someone who so thoroughly and enjoyably challenged her. Even when she spoke of her existence under Naraku's thumb and her failed attempts at rebellion, she did not sense that those admissions were viewed as proof of weakness.

She had not realized what a burden those memories were until she spoke of them, and felt their weight ease in the telling. Kagura had never felt quite so free before -- and she owed her thanks to the grand demon for that.

From their place high among the clouds, she could see that winter was finally losing its grip on the world below, vast expanses of white peppered with the first traces of brown and green. "Where is Sesshomaru today?" the woman asked as they walked about the upper deck of the palace.

"He left early this morning to tend to some business," Kagura replied breezily. It was, in fact, all she knew: he'd told her no more before departing, and revealed that much only because she woke to ask before he escaped the palace.

"How cruel of him, leaving you and the children alone like that," the woman sniffed, "not to mention his poor mother."

"He's never gone long," she chuckled. "I'll be surprised if he's not back by sunset."

"You seem so confident in that."

"It's always been rewarded before."

The grand demon smiled sidelong at her. "He has changed a great deal since he was a young pup. In the past he could not abide half demons and considered humans so far beneath him as to be unworthy of the effort needed to slay them. Have you been part of that?"

"I would think Rin was," Kagura shrugged. "I am the wind. I'm only human insofar as this body is; when it dies, I'll become unbound again."

"It's happened before?"

She nodded, touching the fan in her sleeve. "When the twins were born." She was still surprised she'd lasted long enough to see that through--

"Will it happen again?"

"...eventually." Sooner than she might like: the song of the wind had been growing sweeter in recent days, and while it would have been easy to blame that on the coming of spring, she was beginning to feel something within her stir in answer...

"Have you considered taking a demon body the next time?"

Kagura paused, casting a questioning glance toward the grand demon. "Human bodies are not exactly known for their resilience," she continued. "Perhaps a demon body would better suit the wind. It would certainly put more power at your disposal -- perhaps it would offer greater longevity, as well."

"It's possible," Kagura conceded. It came with its own risks, of course: would the wind be able to overpower a demon's soul when it tried to revive, or would she be the one forced out? And would she be able to make use of whatever skill the demon innately possessed, or would it interfere with her command of the wind...

"Baba!"

Setsuna's voice broke her from her thoughts. As both women turned to look, the girls scampered up the steps toward them with Jaken trailing far behind, each one presenting a handful of white and purple flowers when the grand demon knelt to greet them. "My, how lovely! Are these for me?" Towa beamed and nodded, scrubbing her nose with a grubby hand. "Pray tell, where did you find such lovely blooms so early in the spring?"

"Down there," the child replied eagerly, pointing to the lower gardens. Someone would likely be working very hard to clean up a very large mess in the near future...

The imp at last staggered to the top of the steps. "I'm getting too old for this," he wheezed, leaning against his two-headed staff.

The grand demon snapped her fingers, turning her attention toward him. "Little demon."

"It's _Jaken,_ my good lady," he grumbled.

"Fetch a vase and water for these flowers," she continued, seeming not to have heard him at all.

The imp heaved a long-suffering sigh. "At once, my good lady..."

A shadow passed over them, and Jaken's mood immediately seemed to cheer. "Lord Sesshomaru!"

The twins looked up, bouncing eagerly in place as their father drifted down toward them. "Welcome back," Kagura called, a satisfied grin cutting across her face. Her confidence in him, as ever, had not been misplaced.

"Where have you been all day?" his mother pouted. "I was beginning to wonder if you planned to return at all."

He shot a venomous look toward her. "I had business elsewhere."

"What sort?" she pressed.

By way of answer, he opened his hand to reveal two pearls, one gold and one silver. "Where did you come by those?" the grand demon asked.

"What are they for?" Kagura added.

"To protect Towa and Setsuna," Sesshomaru replied, ignoring his mother's question entirely. As he knelt, the girls hopped back a step, peering eagerly at the prizes he'd brought. When each child reached out to touch one, the gems began to shine, floating up from his hand -- and when the children tried to snatch for them, the pearls flew toward them, disappearing into their eyes.

Both girls yelped in alarm, rubbing their faces with dirt-stained hands, though they swiftly calmed as their father pet their hair. "We will leave soon," he said.

“Already?" the grand demon sighed. "It hardly feels like I saw you during your time here."

"I have business to tend to," he replied. "Kagura and the children will be coming with me."

"Would you willfully place them in danger?" she asked.

"Never." 

Sesshomaru met his mother's gaze without wavering; at last she turned her gaze toward the sky, idly adjusting the fur wrapped around her shoulders. "Do be sure to visit again soon," she insisted. "I would like to see these pups again before they are fully grown."

"I'll do my best to see that done," Kagura promised. "But before we go anywhere, we should get the both of you cleaned up." The twin girls looked up at her, each squinting one eye from where the pearls had made their new homes...but, agreeably, they both held out their hands and allowed their mother to see them off to first a bath, then to bed. The journey ahead would be a long one, she was sure -- and though the wind called for her to come, and _soon,_ she vowed to wait.

For their sakes, she would delay that as long as she could.

\-----

Four years seemed to be the limit of a human body.

Kagura had been so sure, before, that it was the strain of the pregnancy and the twins' birth that had broken her last time. That she wouldn't need to worry about an early death to anything but bad luck anymore. But it seemed that a human form simply was not meant to hold the wind. Not for long, at least. With every season that passed, the gale's song called more insistently, and a part of her soul strained to answer it, _join_ it, in spite of her fierce desire to remain.

The children hadn't noticed anything amiss. But Sesshomaru had. They had spoken of it in the long dark nights of the past winter: the inevitable death of her body, what it would do to the twins, whether to shield them from it and how to do so...and just as they had with the naming, they came to no clear answer. Only scattered notions, and an understanding that when the time came, they would decide.

She managed to hold a while longer, at least, through another spring and summer. More and more often she found herself drifting, her mind drawn by the passing breeze and following its winding course until someone called her back to her body. Often enough it was Towa or Setsuna, hurrying over to show her some flower or frog or fruit they'd stumbled across in their explorations...but there were times when it was Sesshomaru's voice that drew her, his eyes that met hers when she returned to the present...

And once -- so recently that the memory alone now anchored her when she threatened to stray -- his hand on her cheek.

They had agreed, then, that it was time. That morning they'd flown east again, to the forest just beyond a familiar village. And while Sesshomaru departed with Jaken in tow, Kagura stayed behind, occupying herself in a game with the twins. 

"Ready!" Towa called, waving her arms excitedly over her head. Kagura flicked her fan open as the child sprinted through the thin brush -- and when she jumped to clear a raised tree root, the wind picked her up, carrying her higher into the air while she laughed and wheeled and danced before finally dropping her into a great pile of leaves they’d gathered as a cushion.

"Your turn, Setsuna," Kagura called, shuttering the fan as she looked toward her younger daughter. The child beamed, hopping in place a few times before racing through the undergrowth...only to trip on the same root her sister had so effortlessly cleared. Rather than fall, though, the wind lifted her gently, rocking and bouncing her until she began to giggle herself -- and only then whisking her off to join Towa, who had just pulled herself out of the mound and immediately toppled back into it as her sister bowled her over.

Listening to their giddy laughter, she couldn't help but smile. She could not imagine taking this happiness away from them; she could not _bear_ the thought of never again being part of it.

As the twins tumbled out of the leaves and scampered back to where they'd started, she heard a quiet rustle nearby, soft footsteps approaching through the trees. Looking up, she saw a shape moving toward them, shining silver in the dappled light...and at last Sesshomaru stepped out of the shadows with Jaken at his heels. "Papa!!" the girls cheered, both immediately racing toward him -- and Kagura laughed softly to herself, flicking her fan open and spinning them up high enough to dive into the thick fur wrapped around their father's shoulder.

"Well?" she asked, hiding a grin behind her half-shuttered instrument when the demon idly lifted his arm to hold the children up.

"Rin agreed to come shortly," he replied. "She offered to bring Moroha to visit, as well."

"Big sister's coming?" Towa gasped.

"And Moro?" Setsuna added eagerly.

He made a quiet sound that they all knew meant agreement. The twins cheered as he knelt down, sliding to the ground and clasping one another’s arms while they bounced excitedly in place; he moved to Kagura, then, offering his hand and helping her carefully to her feet. "Jaken," he called.

"Yes, Milord?" the imp replied.

"Watch over them."

Jaken bowed deeply. "Of course, Milord. When do you expect to return?"

"A few days."

The children stilled, turning to look at their parents. "You're leaving?" Setsuna whined, clinging to her sister's sleeve.

"We need to go away for a little while," Kagura murmured, crouching down to meet their eyes. "It won't be for long, and you'll have Jaken to look after you and Rin and Moroha to play with. But...Mama's going to look different when she comes back."

"How come?" Towa asked, her small hands clinging to Kagura's fingers.

"I'm the wind," she smiled. "It's not easy to hold, you know. You've seen it," she chuckled, watching the twins nod in agreement. "My body -- this one you see now...because I'm the wind, it can't hold me forever. I have to go find a new one that can. So when we get back, whoever you see with Papa will be me. Do you understand?"

They both nodded, moving close to hug her, and she wrapped her arms around them and embraced them both. "Don't be too hard on Jaken while we're gone. And take care of each other. We'll be back soon, alright?"

"Yes, Mama," they both mumbled. 

She pressed a kiss to each of their foreheads before releasing them at last, rising once more to her feet and offering a final parting wave before following Sesshomaru into the shadows beneath the trees. Only after the twins were well behind them did they take to the sky, flying high over the forests and toward the mountains far to the west: she had no intention of leaving behind a familiar body for their children to find. As the sun began to fall beneath the high peaks, they landed among the flowering crags, and one by one she removed her earrings and the pin in her hair, returning them to their ornate box. Settling comfortably there among the pale blooms, she withdrew the fan from her sleeve and offered both items to Sesshomaru with a faint smile. "For safekeeping," she said.

He took them without a word, tucking them beneath his armor. She closed her eyes, breathing in the cool, fragrant air...

Kagura's breath whispered out in a long, slow sigh, carrying the wind that had been trapped so long within its human shell. Sesshomaru looked on silently, stirring only when a warm breeze kissed the moon on his brow; she swirled slowly around him while he withdrew a single white plume from beneath his cuirass, and as he held it in his outstretched hand she spun it high above his head.

He followed, and the wind bore him up in the feather's wake, carrying them toward the darkening sky.

***

It took some time to find a suitable body for her this time; for all of mankind's countless conflicts and pointless dramas, few left corpses suitable to their interests. He soared over countless battlefields, the ruins of castles and villages, farmsteads left barren and fallow, but as the feather never strayed lower, he continued to follow the wind as the sun rose and set again.

With the next nightfall, the plume at last drifted toward the earth again. What he found was not a scene of carnage nor combat, but a calamity of nature: a rockfall that had taken some traveling procession by surprise, leaving all deceased. The woman hanging out of the palanquin stirred and pulled herself free as the gale took control of her limbs, and in but a moment more he drew Tenseiga and bound the wind to her new body. Helping Kagura to her feet, he waited patiently as she grew accustomed to her new limbs before offering her the box and fan she had entrusted to him; once she donned her earrings and pinned her hair in her preferred style, he gathered her into his trailing fur, and with her fan drawing the wind beneath them they flew once more toward the east.

"You know," she mused as the sun began to rise before them, "your mother made an interesting suggestion."

Any idea from his mother was likely to be fraught with unspoken peril. But he said nothing, waiting instead for her to continue. "She asked whether I'd thought of trying a demon body, instead of a human one. Given how long the first two lasted...it seemed worth mentioning."

...there was no denying that demons were far more resilient than humans. It posed its own challenges, but it could also provide greater stability in the future. "We can take it into consideration," he agreed.

"Next time," Kagura finished for him. They continued on in comfortable silence while the territory below changed, growing more familiar the higher the sun rose in the sky--

The stench of smoke reached them first. Though he said nothing, he felt her tense, shifting to watch the landscape below change from dense woodland to green fields to human settlements, shifting from one to the next with every mile they passed...until a charred expanse of burned trees commanded the whole of their attention. The forest itself was not entirely lost, but the blackened swathe stretched nearly to the village, stopping just short of a lone tree towering over the surrounding area...

And the abandoned well just beyond.

He did not land. He dove straight into the heart of the destruction, darting through the seared waste in search of a sign, a trace, a scent--

He stopped suddenly, breathing deep despite the acrid bite of smoke that clouded his senses. Beyond the burning odor there was something else, something _alive_...and familiar. Bounding toward the edge of the destruction, the scent grew more pronounced -- and with it came the small, muffled sound of a child's sobs...

Kagura caught sight of her first. "Setsuna!" At her mother's call, the child looked up from the roots she'd taken shelter among, the soot and ash on her face streaked through by tears. By the time she picked herself up, Sesshomaru had already reached her side, kneeling to wrap his fur around her even as Kagura gathered the child up -- something Setsuna seemed to question only briefly before remembering her mother's words from before they departed.

Fresh tears welled in the girl's eyes as she clung to her mother, burying her face in Kagura’s shoulder. "What happened?" his wife asked, her voice gentle despite the desperation coursing beneath it. "Where's your sister?"

"I don't know!" the child sobbed. "Sh-she woke me-e up and everythi-ing was on f-fi-fire a-and we we-ere runni-i-ing away and she wa-as holding m-m-my hand but...th-then sh-she wasn't anymo-ore, and I tripped, a-and a tree fe-ell and...I p-pushed her out of the wa-ay a-and couldn't f-find her aga-ain!"

"We will find her," Sesshomaru said. "Where is Jaken?"

Setsuna looked up at him with wide, frightened eyes. "I...I dunno, I-I di-idn't see him in the fi-ire..."

Rising smoothly to his feet, he retreated into the blackened woods, hearing Kagura's steps close behind. He found the first trace of his retainer's scent near the place where the blaze had broken out -- a scent nearly overpowered by the unfamiliar stench of another, unknown demon. Jaken's slightly charred body lay pinned beneath the remnants of heavy branch, now reduced to little more than charcoal...but though Kagura shielded Setsuna from the sight, they all saw the body stir as his master approached. "Jaken," Sesshomaru called.

"Y...yes, Milord?" the demon whispered.

"What happened," he ordered, kneeling on the blackened earth while Kagura cleared away the crumbling debris.

"Something...came in the night," Jaken coughed, offering up no protest when she gathered him up alongside Setsuna. "It sought you, Milord...and barring that, the children. I tried to fight it..."

"That's enough, Jaken." The demon fell silent at his master's order, and Sesshomaru wasted no time in retracing their steps back to the place where they had found Setsuna; from there, he set out in the opposite direction, following the faded trail of his younger daughter...until, at last, he caught the slightest trace of her sister's scent. Following it on through the smouldering trees to the great tree at the edge of the forest--

The trail stopped.

He paused, retracing his steps. The scent was strongest just beyond the base of the tree...and then it simply ended. She had not been carried up or away, there were no other scents either demon or human that he could detect...

"What is it?"

He glanced back at Kagura, still carrying both Setsuna and Jaken. Their daughter whimpered, her stare pleading for answers that he could not give...

"The trail ends here," he replied, looking down at the place where the scent abruptly cut off. "I can find no others, demon or human. It seems as though Towa vanished from this spot."

A heavy silence fell over them all.

Kagura dropped to her knees, clutching Setsuna close against her. " _Damn_ this weak body!" she snarled. "This _never_ should have happened -- I should have held another day, damn it -- _damn it all..._ "

Moving to join her, he wrapped his fur close around his wife, a heavy weight pressing down upon his chest as he knelt at her side. "The fault is not yours," he said quietly, smoothing Setsuna's hair while the child wept against her mother's shoulder. She had no control over the death of her human body; he saw no cause to blame her for this. 

He was the one who had chosen to leave them behind in lands outside his control. 

The fault was his, for not protecting them. 

Sesshomaru felt anew the limits of his own power, as keenly as he had on emerging from the Netherworld and finding that Rin could not be revived -- as keenly as he had in that field of flowers long ago, when Tenseiga could not save the wind sorceress who had finally claimed her freedom.

But this time, there was no way to reclaim what had been lost.

/////

They returned to the mountain in the wake of the fire, settling again in the village where the twins had spent their first year. The people there had been confused, at first, by the unfamiliar woman with the child they recognized, and all the more when she bore the same name and memories as the woman they had known; but as easily as they'd come to believe Kagura the wife of a deity, they adopted the notion that she herself must be some manner of spirit, and asked for nothing more.

They stayed a while, nursing the wound left by Towa's disappearance. Sesshomaru continued to vanish before dawn, expanding the reach of his territory step by step...but shortly after dusk each evening, he returned to the garden where they waited, leaving again only when light stained the dark mountain peaks on the distant horizon. His company remained as comfortable as ever...and somehow comforting, as well. The loss weighed heavy on them both: sharing the burden with one another made it somewhat easier to bear.

Setsuna became quieter in her sister's absence, more watchful, more serious, until Kagura began to think she took mostly after her father despite any physical evidence to the contrary. Soon enough she came to an age where the village women suggested she take up training, perhaps in flower arrangement or an instrument...but when given the choice, Setsuna picked something entirely different: the naginata. Watching her daughter wield the training staff, Kagura noticed how a breeze seemed to trail after each sweep and turn, so faint it might easily have been mistaken for nothing -- but Kagura was the wind: she recognized that subtle draw as a power not so different from her own. And so Setsuna trained with a human instructor by day, learning forms and repeating movements until they became second nature; and by night she trained with her mother, learning to command the flow of air and bend the breeze to her will. 

Jaken healed in time, though he seemed determined to rectify his failure by minding Setsuna ever more closely, going so far as to stay behind while his master traveled even without needing an order -- a grand gesture in theory, if somewhat pointless while they remained so close to humans. Sesshomaru's threat still held weight, it seemed, and no demons dared trespass anywhere near the village. She almost laughed when she heard that a demon slayer had come to ply his trade -- and all the more when she recognized the slayer as Kohaku.

They resumed their journey eventually, once Sesshomaru's travels began to take him too far to return in a day. It was strange, at first, too still and too quiet with only one child at their heels...but time eventually softened that feeling, as gradually as the waves smoothed a jagged stone. Soon enough it became familiar, then comfortable, then commonplace, and though they never forgot the voice now gone from their wanderings, it no longer felt as though something was missing in their present.

The world had changed. But they lived on, all the same.

The wind called for her, eventually, as she knew it would. They prepared for it as best they could, considering all their possible options: experience had taught them that a human body would only last a few years, but it was easy enough to occupy and claim for her own; a demon body might last longer, but there was no way of knowing whether the wind could overpower that soul when it tried to return; a puppet would likely last longest, her soul fixed to a simple object while controlling a body from afar...but selfishly, she wanted to be _present_ in her life, to _feel_ it as more than mere pressure when she embraced her daughter, or when Sesshomaru's fur wrapped close around her.

They discussed it all together, when her time grew short again. And in the end, they decided to try something new.

"It may take time to find a suitable demon," Sesshomaru remarked as she removed her earrings and hair pin.

"I know," she agreed, returning them to their lacquered box. "If you don't mind searching, I can be patient." He took it with a slight nod when she offered it to him, tucking it into his armor and removing the white plume in its place.

"What will happen to you?" Setsuna asked, a slight tremor in her quiet voice.

"I'll go back to being the wind for a while," Kagura replied, kneeling down before her. "But I'll still be right here with you. You'll be able to feel it, and know it's me."

Setsuna seemed unconvinced. Smiling to herself, Kagura removed the fan from her sleeve and held it out to her daughter. "Would you hold on to this for me?" she asked. "For safekeeping, until I can take it back."

The child's violet eyes went wide as she took the instrument in her hands, holding it close against her chest. "I will," she promised.

"I know it’s in good hands," Kagura chuckled, touching a kiss to her daughter's forehead. She made herself comfortable among the twisting roots of a maple tree, its canopy the same brilliant red as the streaks in Setsuna's hair and her own; breathing in the cool, sweet air, she let it out in a long, slow sigh...

The wind rustled through the fallen leaves, swirling them up around the two full demons and the half-demon child beside them. Setsuna closed her eyes when it gently ruffled through her bangs, holding the fan closer to her chest; her father silently held the white plume in his open palm, and the warm breeze kissed the moon on his brow before lifting the feather and carrying it up toward the bright autumn sky.

"Come, Setsuna," he murmured. She obeyed without hesitation, holding fast to his trailing fur even as it wrapped around her. Once his feet left the ground, the wind bore them higher, and they set their sights on the western shore shining beyond the mountain peaks ahead.

In spite of all that came before, they chose to continue forward.

Come what may, they would live on together.


End file.
